LIBRARY 

OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA. 

• 

Class 


JHns.  lames  ®.  li 


UNDER   THE   OLIVE.     Poems.      32mo,  $1.25. 
HOW   TO   HELP   THE    POOR.     i6mo,  boards, 

60  cents  ;  paper,  20  cents,  net. 
THE    SINGING    SHEPHERD,    AND    OTHER 

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HOUGHTON   MIFFLIN  COMPANY 
BOSTON  AND  NEW  YORK 


Authors  and  Friends 

by 
Annie  Fields 


BOSTON   AND    NEW   YORK 
HOUGHTON    MIFFLIN   COMPANY 

ftitoersibe  j&re^,  Cambrib0e 


1 "  The  Company  of  the  Leaf  "  wore  laurel  chaplets  "  whose  lusty 
green  may  not  appaired  be."  They  represent  the  brave  and  stead 
fast  of  all  ages,  the  great  knights  and  champions,  the  constant  lovers 
and  pure  women  of  past  and  present  times.' 

Keping  beautie  fresh  and  greene 
For  there  nis  storme  that  ne  may  hem  deface. 

GEOFFREY  CHAUCER. 


CONTENTS 

PAGE 

LONGFELLOW:  1807-1882       ......  i 

GLIMPSES  OF  EMERSON 65 

OLIVER  WENDELL  HOLMES:   PERSONAL  RECOLLEC 
TIONS  AND  UNPUBLISHED  LETTERS  .        .       .       .107 

DAYS  WITH  MRS.  STOWE  .....*.  157 

CELIA  THAXTER     ........  227 

WHITTIER  :  NOTES  OF  HIS  LIFE  AND  OF  HIS  FRIEND 
SHIPS        261 

TENNYSON 335 

LADY  TENNYSON        .......  349 


The  Publishers  of  Harper's  Magazine  and  of  the  Century  Maga 
zine  have  kindly  allowed  the  republication  in  this  volume  of  such 
papers  as  have  been  printed  in  their  pages. 


LONGFELLOW 

1807-1882 


OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY 


OF 


LONGFELLOW 
1807-1882 

EVERY  year  when  the  lilac  buds  begin  to  burst 
their  sheaths  and  until  the  full-blown  clusters 
have  spent  themselves  in  the  early  summer  air, 
the  remembrance  of  Longfellow  — something  of 
his  presence  —  wakes  with  us  in  the  morning  and 
recurs  with  every  fragrant  breeze.  "  Now  is  the 
time  to  come  to  Cambridge,"  he  would  say  ;  "  the 
lilacs  are  getting  ready  to  receive  you." 

It  was  the  most  natural  thing  in  the  world  that 
he  should  care  for  this  common  flower,  because 
in  spite  of  a  fine  separateness  from  dusty  levels 
which  every  one  felt  who  approached  him,  he  was 
first  of  all  a  seer  of  beauty  in  common  things  and 
a  singer  to  the  universal  heart. 

Perhaps  no  one  of  the  masters  who  have 
touched  the  spirits  of  humanity  to  finer  issues 
has  been  more  affectionately  followed  through 
his  ways  and  haunts  than  Longfellow.  But  the 
lives  of  men  and  women  "  who  rule  us  from  their 
urns  "  have  always  been  more  or  less  cloistral. 
Public  curiosity  appeared  to  be  stimulated  rather 
than  lessened  in  Longfellow's  case  by  the  gen 
eral  acquaintance  with  his  familiar  figure  and  by 


4  LONGFELLOW 

his  unceasing  hospitality.  He  was  a  tender  fa 
ther,  a  devoted  friend,  and  a  faithful  citizen,  and 
yet  something  apart  and  different  from  all  these. 

From  his  early  youth  Longfellow  was  a  scholar. 
Especially  was  his  power  of  acquiring  language 
most  unusual. 

As  his  reputation  widened,  he  was  led  to  ob 
serve  this  to  be  a  gift  as  well  as  an  acquirement. 
It  gave  him  the  convenient  and  agreeable  power 
of  entertaining  foreigners  who  sought  his  soci 
ety.  He  said  one  evening,  late  in  life,  that  he 
could  not  help  being  struck  with  the  little 
trouble  it  was  to  him  to  recall  any  language  he 
had  ever  studied,  even  though  he  had  not  spoken 
it  for  years.  He  had  found  himself  talking 
Spanish,  for  instance,  with  considerable  ease  a 
few  days  before.  He  said  he  could  not  recall 
having  even  read  anything  in  Spanish  for  many 
years,  and  it  was  certainly  thirty  since  he  had 
given  it  any  study.  Also,  it  was  the  same  with 
German.  "  I  cannot  imagine,"  he  continued, 
"what  it  would  be  to  take  up  a  language  and 
try  to  master  it  at  this  period  of  my  life.  I 
cannot  remember  how  or  when  I  learned  any  of 
them ;  —  to-night  I  have  been  speaking  Ger 
man,  without  rinding  the  least  difficulty." 

A  scholar  himself,  he  did  not  write  for  schol 
ars,  nor  study  for  the  sole  purpose  of  becoming 
a  light  to  any  university.  It  was  the  energy  of 
a  soul  looking  for  larger  expansion  ;  a  spirit  true 
to  itself  and  its  own  prompting,  finding  its  way 


LONGFELLOW  5 

by  labor  and  love  to  the  free  use  and  devel 
opment  of  the  power  within  him.  Of  his  early 
years  some  anecdotes  have  been  preserved  in  a 
private  note-book  which  have  not  appeared  else 
where  ;  among  them  this  bit  of  reminiscence 
from  Hawthorne,  who  said,  in  speaking  of  his 
own  early  life  and  the  days  at  Bowdoin  College, 
where  he  and  Longfellow  were  in  the  same 
class,  that  no  two  young  men  could  have  been 
more  unlike.  Longfellow,  he  explained,  was 
a  tremendous  student,  and  always  carefully 
dressed,  while  he  himself  was  extremely  care 
less  of  his  appearance,  no  student  at  all,  and 
entirely  incapable  at  that  period  of  appreciat 
ing  Longfellow. 

The  friendship  between  these  two  men  rip 
ened  with  the  years.  Throughout  Longfellow's 
published  correspondence,  delightful  letters  are 
found  to  have  been  exchanged.  The  very  con 
trast  between  the  two  natures  attracted  them 
more  and  more  to  each  other  as  time  went  on  ; 
and  among  the  later  unpublished  letters  I  find 
a  little  note  from  Longfellow  in  which  he  says 
he  has  had  a  sad  letter  from  Hawthorne,  and 
adds  :  "  I  wish  we  could  have  a  little  dinner  for 
him,  of  two  sad  authors  and  two  jolly  publish 
ers,  nobody  else !  " 

As  early  as  1 849,  letters  and  visits  were  famil 
iarly  exchanged  between  Mr.  Fields  and  him 
self,  and  their  friendship  must  have  begun  even 
earlier.  He  writes  :  — 


6  LONGFELLOW 

"  MY  DEAR  FIELDS,  —  I  am  extremely  glad 
you  like  the  new  poems  so  well.  What  think 
you  of  the  enclosed  instead  of  the  sad  ending 
of  '  The  Ship '  ?  Is  it  better  ?  .  .  .  I  send  you 
also  ( The  Lighthouse/  once  more :  I  think  it 
is  improved  by  your  suggestions.  See  if  you 
can  find  anything  more  to  retouch.  And  finally, 
here  is  a  letter  from  Hirst.  You  see  what  he 
wants,  but  I  do  not  feel  like  giving  my  '  Dedi 
cation  '  to  the  'Courier.'  Therefore  I  hereby 
give  it  to  you  so  that  I  can  say  it  is  .disposed  of. 
Am  I  right  or  wrong  ?  " 

Of  Longfellow's  student  days,  Mr.  Fields 
once  wrote  :  "  I  hope  they  keep  bright  the  lit 
tle  room  numbered  twenty-seven  in  Maine  Hall 
in  Bowdoin  College,  for  it  was  in  that  pleasant 
apartment,  looking  out  on  the  pine  groves,  that 
the  young  poet  of  nineteen  wrote  many  of  those 
beautiful  earlier  pieces,  now  collected  in  his 
works.  These  early  poems  were  all  composed 
in  1824  and  1825,  during  his  last  years  in  col 
lege,  and  were  printed  first  in  a  periodical  called 
'  The  United  States  Literary  Gazette/  the  sapi 
ent  editor  of  which  magazine  once  kindly  ad 
vised  the  ardent  young  scholar  to  give  up  poetry 
and  buckle  down  to  the  study  of  law  !  '  No  good 
can  come  of  it/  he  said ;  '  don't  let  him  do  such 
things ;  make  him  stick  to  prose ! '  But  the 
pine-trees  waving  outside  his  window  kept  up  a 
perpetual  melody  in  his  heart,  and  he  could  not 
choose  but  sing  back  to  them." 


LONGFELLOW  7 

One  of  the  earliest  pictures  I  find  of  the 
every-day  life  of  Longfellow  when  a  youth  is  a 
little  anecdote  told  by  him,  in  humorous  illus 
tration  of  the  woes  of  young  authors.  I  quote 
from  a  brief  diary.  "  Longfellow  amused  us 
to-day  by  talking  of  his  youth,  and  especially 
with  a  description  of  the  first  poem  he  ever 
wrote,  called  'The  Battle  of  Lovell's  Pond.'  It 
was  printed  in  a  Portland  newspaper  one  morn 
ing,  and  the  same  evening  he  was  invited  to  the 
house  of  the  Chief  Justice  to  meet  his  son,  a 
rising  poet  just  returned  from  Harvard.  The 
judge  rose  in  a  stately  manner  during  the  even 
ing  and  said  to  his  son  :  '  Did  you  see  a  poem 
in  to-day's  paper  upon  the  Battle  of  Lovell's 
Pond?'  'No,  sir,'  said  the  boy,  'I  did  not.' 
'  Well,  sir,'  responded  his  father,  '  it  was  a  very 

stiff  production.  G ,  get  your  own  poem 

on  the  same  subject,  and  I  will  read  it  to  the 
company.'  The  poem  was  read  aloud,  while 
the  perpetrator  of  the  '  stiff  production '  sat,  as 
he  said,  very  still  in  a  corner." 

The  great  sensitiveness  of  his  nature,  one  of 
the  poetic  qualities,  was  observed  very  early, 
and  the  description  of  him  as  a  little  boy  was 
the  description  of  the  heart  and  nature  of  the 
man.  "  Active,  eager,  impressionable  ;  quick 
tempered,  but  as  quickly  appeased ;  kind- 
hearted  and  affectionate,  —  the  sunlight  of  the 
house."  One  day  when  a  child  of  ten  he  came 
home  with  his  eyes  full  of  tears.  His  elder 


8  LONGFELLOW 

brother  was  fond  of  a  gun,  and  had  allowed 
Henry  to  borrow  his.  To  the  little  boy's  great 
distress,  he  had  aimed  at  and  shot  a  robin.  He 
never  tried  to  use  a  gun  again. 

Longfellow  was  said  to  be  very  like  his  mo 
ther.  His  brother  wrote  of  him :  "  From  her 
must  have  come  to  Henry  the  imaginative  and 
romantic  side  of  his  nature.  She  was  fond  of 
poetry  and  music,  and  in  her  youth,  of  dancing 
and  social  gayety.  She  was  a  lover  of  nature 
in  all  its  aspects.  She  would  sit  by  a  window 
during  a  thunderstorm  enjoying  the  excitement 
of  its  splendors.  Her  disposition,  through  all 
trials  and  sorrows,  was  always  cheerful,  with  a 
gentle  and  tranquil  fortitude." 

No  words  could  describe  her  son's  nature 
more  nearly.  When  he  was  only  sixteen  years 
old  we  find  him  writing  to  his  father :  "I  wish 
I  could  be  in  Washington  during  the  winter, 
though  I  suppose  it  is  rather  vain  to  wish  when 
it  is  almost  impossible  for  our  wishes  to  become 
realities.  It  would  be  more  pleasant  to  get  a 
peep  at  Southern  people  and  draw  a  breath  of 
Southern  air,  than  to  be  always  freezing  in  the 
North ;  but  I  have  very  resolutely  concluded  to 
enjoy  myself  heartily  wherever  I  am.  I  find  it 
most  profitable  to  form  such  plans  as  are  least 
liable  to  failure." 

His  mother's  sympathy  with  his  literary  tastes 
was  certainly  unusual.  He  writes  to  her  from 
college  when  he  was,  sixteen  years  old.  "  I  have 


LONGFELLOW  9 

this  evening  been  reading  a  few  pages  in  Gray's 
odes.  I  am  very  much  pleased  with  them."  .  .  . 
To  which  she  replies  :  "  I  wish  you  would  bring 
Gray  home  with  you.  I  have  a  strong  incli 
nation  to  read  the  poems,  since  you  commend 
them  so  highly.  I  think  I  should  be  pleased 
with  them,  though  Dr.  Johnson  was  not.  I  do 
not  think  the  Doctor  possessed  much  sensibility 
to  the  charms  of  poetry,  and  he  was  sometimes 
most  unmerciful  in  his  criticism." 

The  single  aim  of  Longfellow's  life,  the  man 
ner  in  which  from  his  earliest  days  he  dedicated 
himself  to  Letters,  would  prove  alone,  if  other 
signs  were  lacking,  the  strength  of  his  charac 
ter.  When  he  was  only  eighteen  he  wrote  to 
his  mother :  "  With  all  my  usual  delinquency, 
however,  I  should  have  answered  your  letter 
before  this,  had  I  not  received,  on  Monday, 
Chatterton's  Works,  for  which  I  had  some  time 
since  sent  to  Boston.  It  is  an  elegant  work  in 
three  large  octavo  volumes  ;  and  since  Monday 
noon  I  have  read  the  greater  part  of  two  of 
them,  besides  attending  two  lectures  a  day,  of 
an  hour  each,  and  three  recitations  of  the  same 
length,  together  with  my  study-hours  for  prepa 
ration." 

This  is  said  to  have  been  the  first  handsome 
book  the  young  student  owned,  and  it  was 
earned  by  the  work  of  his  pen.  In  this  same 
year,  too,  we  find  him  hurrying  with  his  lessons 
(not  slighting  them),  that  he  might  get  leisure 


io  LONGFELLOW 

to  read  and  think.  "Leisure,"  he  wrote  his 
father,  "which  is  to  me  one  of  the  sweetest 
things  in  the  world."  .  .  .  "  I  wish  I  could  read 
and  write  at  the  same  time." 

The  eager  activity  of  his  mind  was  already 
asserting  itself,  an  activity  which  hardly  slack 
ened  to  the  very  end. 

The  severe  criticism  of  his  poem  on  the  Bat 
tle  of  Lovell's  Pond  may  have  cost  him  a  few 
tears  one  night,  but  it  did  not  alter  his  deter 
mination.  He  continued  to  send  contributions 
to  the  newspapers,  and  when  his  father  some 
what  later  suggested  that  he  should  consider 
the  question  of  "studying  for  a  profession,"  he 
replied  :  "  If  so,  what  profession  ?  I  have  a  par 
ticular  and  strong  prejudice  for  one  course  of 
life  to  which  you,  I  fear,  will  not  agree."  He 
was  not  unwilling  to  pay  the  price  for  what 
he  intended  to  attain.  He  knew  himself,  and 
his  only  suffering  was  at  the  thought  of  being 
obliged  to  turn  aside  from  the  aims  which  Na 
ture  held  before  him. 

He  was  seventeen  years  old  when  he  wrote 
to  a  friend  :  "  Somehow,  and  yet  I  hardly,  know 
why,  I  am  unwilling  to  study  a  profession.  I 
cannot  make  a  lawyer  of  any  eminence,  because 
I  have  not  a  talent  for  argument ;  I  am  not 
good  enough  for  a  minister,  —  and  as  to  Physic, 
I  utterly  and  absolutely  detest  it." 

To  his  father  the  same  year  he  wrote ;  "  I 
have  already  hinted  to  you  what  would  best 


LONGFELLOW  11 

please  me.  I  want  to  spend  one  year  at  Cam 
bridge  for  the  purpose  of  reading  history,  and 
of  becoming  familiar  with  the  best  authors  in 
polite  literature ;  whilst  at  the  same  time  I  can 
be  acquiring  the  Italian  language,  without  an  ac 
quaintance  with  which  I  shall  be  shut  out  from 
one  of  the  most  beautiful  departments  of  let 
ters.  .  .  .  The  fact  is  —  and  I  will  not  disguise 
it  in  the  least,  for  I  think  I  ought  not  —  the 
fact  is,  I  most  eagerly  aspire  after  future  emi 
nence  in  literature ;  my  whole  soul  burns  most 
ardently  for  it,  and  every  earthly  thought  cen 
tres  in  it.  ...  Whether  Nature  has  given  me 
any  capacity  for  knowledge  or  not,  she  has  at 
any  rate  given  me  a  very  strong  predilection  for 
literary  pursuits,  and  I  am  almost  confident  in 
believing  that,  if  I  can  ever  rise  in  the  world, 
it  must  be  by  the  exercise  of  my  talent  in  the 
wide  field  of  literature.  With  such  a  belief  I 
must  say  that  I  am  unwilling  to  engage  in  the 
study  of  the  law.  .  .  .  Whatever  I  do  study 
ought  to  be  engaged  in  with  all  my  soul, — for 
I  WILL  BE  EMINENT  in  something.  .  .  .  Let  me 
reside  one  year  at  Cambridge;  let  me  study 
belles-lettres  ;  and  after  that  time  it  will  not  re 
quire  a  spirit  of  prophecy  to  predict  with  some 
degree  of  certainty  what  kind  of  a  figure  I 
could  make  in  the  literary  world.  If  I  fail  here, 
there  is  still  time  left  for  the  study  of  a  profes 
sion."  ...  His  father  could  not  make  up  his 
mind  to  trust  his  son  to  the  uncertain  reed  of 


12  LONGFELLOW 

literature.  "  As  you  have  not  had  the  fortune 
(I  will  not  say  whether  good  or  ill)  to  be  born 
rich,  you  must  adopt  a  profession  which  will 
afford  you  subsistence  as  well  as  reputation." 

There  was,  however,  a  friendly  compromise 
between  father  and  son,  and  the  young  student 
was  allowed  to  pass  a  year  in  Cambridge.  He 
replied  to  his  father  :  "  I  am  very  much  rejoiced 
that  you  accede  so  readily  to  my  proposition  of 
studying  general  literature  for  one  year  at  Cam 
bridge.  My  grand  object  in  doing  this  will  be 
to  gain  as  perfect  knowledge  of  the  French  and 
Italian  languages  as  can  be  gained  without  trav 
elling  in  France  and  Italy,  —  though  to  tell  the 
truth  I  intend  to  visit  both  before  I  die.  .  .  . 
The  fact  is,  I  have  a  most  voracious  appetite 
for  knowledge.  To  its  acquisition  I  will  sacri 
fice  everything.  .  .  .  Nothing  could  induce  me 
to  relinquish  the  pleasures  of  literature;  .  .  . 
but  I  can  be  a  lawyer.  This  will  support  my 
real  existence,  literature  an  IDEAL  one. 

"  I  purchased  last  evening  a  beautiful  pocket 
edition  of  Sir  William  Jones's  Letters,  and  have 
just  finished  reading  them.  Eight  languages 
he  was  critically  versed  in  ;  eight  more  he  read 
with  a  dictionary  :  and  there  were  twelve  more 
not  wholly  unknown  to  him.  I  have  somewhere 
seen  or  heard  the  observation  that  as  many  lan 
guages  as  a  person  acquires,  so  many  times  is 
he  a  man." 

Happily  —  how  happily  we  can  hardly  say  — 


LONGFELLOW  13 

Madam  Bowdoin  had  left  the  sum  of  one  thou 
sand  dollars  towards  establishing  a  professorship 
of  modern  languages  at  the  college  which  was 
then  only  a  few  years  older  than  Longfellow. 
No  steps  had  yet  been  taken  ;  but  one  of  the 
Board,  Mr.  Orr,  having  been  struck,  it  appears, 
by  the  translation  of  an  ode  from  Horace  made 
by  Longfellow  for  the  senior  examination, 
warmly  presented  his  name  for  the  new  chair. 

It  is  impossible  to  overestimate  the  value  of 
these  benefactions  to  men  of  talent  and  genius. 
Where  would  Wordsworth  have  been,  what  could 
he  have  done,  without  the  gift  bestowed  upon 
him  by  Raisley  Calvert !  In  America  such  as 
sistance  is  oftener  given  in  the  more  impersonal 
way  of  endowment  of  chairs  or  creating  of  schol 
arships.  No  method  less  personal  or  more  ele 
vating  for  the  development  of  the  scholar  and 
man  of  genius  could  easily  be  adopted. 

The  informal  proposal  of  the  Board  that 
Longfellow  should  go  to  Europe  to  fit  himself 
for  his  position  was  precisely  in  a  line  with  his 
most  cherished  wishes.  It  was  nearly  a  year 
from  that  time,  however,  before  he  was  actually 
on  his  way,  "winter  and  rough  weather"  and 
the  infrequency  of  good  ships  causing  many  dc 
lays.  Possibly  also  the  thought  of  the  mother's 
heart  that  he  was  not  yet  twenty  —  still  young 
to  cut  himself  off  from  home  and  friends  — 
weighed  something  in  the  balance.  He  read 
law  in  his  father's  office,  and  wrote  and  read 


14  LONGFELLOW 

with  ceaseless  activity  on  his  own  account ; 
publishing  his  poems  and  prose  papers  in  the 
newspapers  and  annuals  of  the  day.  He  sailed 
from  New  York  at  last,  visiting  Boston  on  his 
way.  There  he  heard  Dr.  Channing  preach 
and  passed  part  of  an  evening  with  him  after 
ward.  Also  Professor  Ticknor  was  kind  to  him, 
giving  him  letters  to  Washington  Irving,  Pro 
fessor  Eichhorn,  and  Robert  Southey.  Dr. 
Charles  Lowell,  the  father  of  the  future  poet, 
gave  him  a  letter  to  Mrs.  Grant,  of  Laggan, 
and  President  Kirkland  was  interested  in  his 
welfare.  Thus  he  started  away  with  such  help 
and  advice  as  the  world  could  give  him. 

From  that  moment  his  career  was  simply  a 
question  of  development.  How  he  could  turn 
the  wondrous  joys,  the  strange  and  solitary  ex 
periences  of  life  into  light  and  knowledge  and 
wisdom  which  he  could  give  to  others  ;  this  was 
the  never-ending  problem  of  his  mind ;  to  this 
end  he  turned  the  labor  of  his  days. 

His  temperament  did  not  allow  him  the  effer 
vescent  expression  common  to  the  young.  On 
the  contrary,  when  writing  to  his  sisters  from 
Italy  during  these  student  days,  he  says  :  "  But 
with  me  all  deep  impressions  are  silent  ones." 
And  thus  the  sorrows  of  life,  of  which  he  early 
bore  so  heavy  a  burden,  found  little  expression. 
He  wore  them  in  his  heart,  whence  they  came 
again  in  his  poems  to  soothe  the  spirit  of  hu 
manity.  The  delightful  story  of  his  three  years 


LONGFELLOW  15 

of  study  and  absence  can  be  traced  step  by 
step  in  the  journals  and  letters  edited  by  his 
brother ;  but  however  interesting  it  is  to  follow 
him  in  every  detail,  it  is  nevertheless  true  that 
the  singleness  of  aim  and  strength  of  character 
which  distinguished  Longfellow,  combined  with 
extreme  delicacy  and  sensitiveness  of  percep 
tion,  were  his  qualities  from  the  beginning  and 
remained  singularly  unchanged  to  the  end. 

His  history  is  not  without  its  tragedies,  but 
they  were  coordinated  in  his  spirit  to  a  sense 
of  the  unity  of  life.  He  was  the  psalmist,  the 
interpreter.  How  could  he  render  again  the 
knowledge  of  divine  goodness  and  divine  love 
which  were  revealed  to  him  ?  First  came  the 
duty  of  acquiring  learning ;  of  getting  the  use 
of  many  languages  and  thus  of  many  forms 
of  thought,  in  order  to  master  the  vehicles  of 
expression.  To  this  end  he  labored  without 
ceasing,  laughing  at  himself  for  calling  that 
labor  which  gave  him  in  the  acquisition  great 
pleasure.  "If  you  call  it  labor!"  he  wrote  in 
one  of  his  letters  home  after  speaking  of  his 
incessant  studies. 

His  journals  and  letters,  except  the  few  early 
ones  to  his  father,  seldom  speak  either  of  the 
heat  of  composition  or  of  the  toils  of  study. 
He  kept  any  mention  of  these,  like  all  his 
deeper  experiences,  to  himself,  but  writes  chiefly 
of  more  external  matters ;  of  his  relaxations  and 
pleasures,  —  such  as  are  surely  indispensable  to 


16  LONGFELLOW 

an  author  and  student  after  extreme  tension  of 
the  brain  and  hours  of  emotion. 

Longfellow  was  twenty-two  years  old  when 
he  took  up  his  residence  as  professor  at  Bow- 
doin  College,  where  he  translated  and  prepared 
the  French  grammar  and  the  French  and  Span 
ish  text-books  which  he  desired  for  his  classes. 
He  was  also  made  college  librarian  —  a  duty 
which  required  only  one  hour  a  day  in  those 
early  times,  but,  added  to  his  other  duties,  gave 
him  all  the  occupation  he  needed.  "The  in 
tervals  of  college  duty  I  fill  up  with  my  own 
studies,"  he  wrote  to  his  friend,  George  W. 
Greene,  with  whom  he  had  already  formed  a 
friendship  which  was  to  continue  unbroken  dur 
ing  their  lives. 

At  the  age  of  twenty-four  Longfellow  mar 
ried  a  lovely  young  lady,  the  daughter  of  Judge 
Potter,  of  Portland.  She  was  entirely  sympa 
thetic  with  his  tastes,  having  herself  received 
a  very  unusual  education  for  those  days  in 
advanced  mathematics  and  other  studies.  In 
the  "  Footsteps  of  Angels  "  she  is  commemo 
rated  as 

"  the  Being  Beauteous 
Who  unto  my  youth  was  given, 
More  than  all  things  else  to  love  me." 

His  brother  writes  of  this  period :  "  They 
were  tenderly  devoted  to  each  other  :  and  never 
was  a  home  more  happy  than  theirs,  when, 
soon  after  their  marriage,  they  began  house- 


LONGFELLOW  17 

keeping  in  Brunswick.  ...  In  this  pleasant 
home,  and  with  this  blessed  companionship, 
Mr.  Longfellow  devoted  himself  with  fresh  in 
terest  to  his  literary  pursuits." 

The  monetary  returns  for  all  his  labors  at  this 
period  in  America  were  inconceivably  small. 
He  amused  his  friends  one  day  in  later  years 
by  confessing  that  Mr.  Buckingham  paid  him 
by  one  year's  subscription  to  the  "  New  Eng 
land  Magazine  "  for  his  translation  of  the  "  C op- 
las  de  Manrique"  and  several  prose  articles. 
After  this  he  sent  his  poems  to  Messrs.  Allen 
and  Ticknor,  who  presented  him  the  volume  in 
which  they  appeared  and  sundry  other  books  as 
compensation. 

What  a  singular  contrast  was  this  beginning 
to  his  future  literary  history !  Late  in  life  his 
publisher  wrote  :  "  I  remember  how  instanta 
neously  in  the  year  1839  'The  Voices  of  the 
Night '  sped  triumphantly  on  its  way.  At 
present  his  currency  in  Europe  is  almost  un 
paralleled.  Twenty-four  publishing  houses  in 
England  have  issued  the  whole  or  a  part  of  his 
works.  Many  of  his  poems  have  been  trans 
lated  into  Russian  and  Hebrew.  '  Evangeline' 
has  been  translated  three  times  into  German, 
and  'Hiawatha'  has  not  only  gone  into  nearly 
all  the  modern  languages,  but  can  now  be  read 
in  Latin.  I  have  seen  translations  of  all  Long 
fellow's  principal  works,  in  prose  and  poetry,  in 
French,  Italian,  German,  Spanish,  Portuguese, 


i8  LONGFELLOW 

Dutch,  Swedish,  and  Danish.  The  Emperor 
of  Brazil  has  himself  translated  and  published 
'  Robert  of  Sicily,'  one  of  the  poems  in  *  Tales 
of  a  Wayside  Inn,'  into  his  native  tongue,  and 
in  China  they  use  a  fan  which  has  become  im 
mensely  popular  on  account  of  the  '  Psalm  of 
Life'  being  printed  on  it  in  the  language  of 
the  Celestial  Empire.  Professor  Kneeland,  who 
went  to  the  national  millennial  celebration  in  Ice 
land,  told  me  that  when  he  was  leaving  that  far 
away  land,  on  the  verge  almost  of  the -Arctic 
Circle,  the  people  said  to  him  :  '  Tell  Longfel 
low  that  we  love  him ;  tell  him  we  read  and  re 
joice  in  his  poems  ;  tell  him  that  Iceland  knows 
him  by  heart.'  To-day  there  is  no  disputing 
the  fact  that  Longfellow  is  more  popular  than 
any  other  living  poet ;  that  his  books  are  more 
widely  circulated,  command  greater  attention, 
and  bring  more  copyright  money  than  those  of 
any  other  author,  not  excepting  Tennyson,  now 
writing  English  verse." 

Meanwhile  the  young  professor,  after  four 
years  of  retirement  and  work  at  Bowdoin,  began 
to  look  about  him  and  to  contemplate  another 
flight.  Before  his  plans  were  laid,  however, 
Professor  Ticknor  relinquished  his  position  at 
Harvard,  which  was  immediately  offered  to  Mr. 
Longfellow  under  what  were  for  that  period 
the  most  delightful  conditions  possible.  Presi 
dent  Quincy  wrote  to  him,  "  The  salary  will  be 
fifteen  hundred  dollars  a  year.  Residence  in 


LONGFELLOW  19 

Cambridge  will  be  required.  .  .  .  Should  it  be 
your  wish,  previously  to  entering  upon  the  duties 
of  the  office,  to  reside  in  Europe,  at  your  own  ex 
pense,  a  year  or  eighteen  months  for  the  purpose 
of  a  more  perfect  attainment  of  the  German,  Mr. 
Ticknor  will  retain  his  office  till  your  return." 

During  his  second  visit  to  Europe  in  the  year 
1835,  this  time  accompanied  by  his  wife,  she 
became  ill  and  died  at  Rotterdam,  "  closing  her 
peaceful  life  by  a  still  more  peaceful  death." 
Longfellow  continued  his  journey  and  his  stud 
ies.  Into  his  lonely  hours,  which  no  society 
and  no  occupation  could  fill,  came,  his  brother 
tells  us,  "the  sense  and  assurance  of  the  spirit 
ual  presence  of  her  who  had  loved  him  and  who 
loved  him  still,  and  whose  dying  lips  had  said, 
'  I  will  be  with  you  and  watch  over  you/  "  At 
Christmas  of  the  same  year  a  new  grief  fell 
upon  him  in  the  death  of  his  brother-in-law  and 
dearest  friend.  He  received  it  as  an  added  ad 
monition  "to  set  about  the  things  he  had  to  do 
in  greater  earnestness." 

"  Henceforth,"  he  wrote,  "  let  me  bear  upon 
my  shield  the  holy  cross." 

No  history  of  Longfellow  can  hope  to  trace 
the  springs  which  fed  his  poetic  mind  without 
recording  the  deep  sorrows,  the  pain,  the  loneli 
ness  of  his  days.  Born  with  especial  love  of 
home  and  all  domesticities,  the  solitary  years 
moved  on,  bringing  him  a  larger  power  for 
soothing  the  grief  of  others  because  he  had 


20  LONGFELLOW 

himself  known  the  darkest  paths  of  earthly 
experience. 

He  continued  his  lonely  studies  at  Heidel 
berg  during  the  winter,  but  with  the  spring, 
when  the  almond-trees  were  blossoming,  the 
spirit  of  youth  revived  and  he  again  took  up  his 
pilgrimage  and  began  the  sketches  published 
some  years  later  as  the  consecutive  story  of 
"Hyperion."  In  the  opening  chapter  of  that 
book  he  says  :  "  The  setting  of  a  great  hope  is 
like  the  setting  of  the  sun.  The  brightness 
of  our  life  is  gone.  Shadows  of  evening  fall 
around  us,  and  the  world  seems  but  a  dim  re 
flection,  —  itself  a  broader  shadow.  We  look 
forward  into  the  coming  lonely  night.  The 
soul  withdraws  into  itself.  Then  stars  arise 
and  the  night  is  holy.  Paul  Flemming  had  ex 
perienced  this,  though  still  young." 

Seven  long,  weary  years  elapsed  between  the 
death  of  his  young  wife  and  the  second  and 
perfect  marriage  of  his  maturity.  In  spite  of 
the  sorrow  and  depression  which  had  over 
whelmed  him,  he  knew  that  his  work  was  the 
basis  upon  which  his  life  must  stand,  and  in 
those  few  years  he  planted  himself  firmly  in  his 
professorship,  published  "  Outre  Mer,"  and  the 
early  poems  which  won  for  him  an  undying  rep 
utation  as  a  poet.  During  this  period,  too,  he 
made  the  great  friendships  of  his  life,  of  which 
he  allowed  no  thread  to  break  during  the  long 
years  to  come.  His  characteristic  steadiness  of 


LONGFELLOW  21 

aim  never  failed  even  in  this  trying  period.  He 
enjoyed  the  singular  advantage  of  travel  in  a 
Europe  which  is  now  chiefly  a  demesne  of  the 
past  and  of  the  imagination.  Having  known  all 
the  picturesqueness  and  beauty  of  England,  he 
settled  himself  in  the  old  Vassall  (or  Craigie) 
House,  in  Cambridge,  with  serene  enjoyment 
and  appreciation.  This  house  was  then  in  a 
retired  spot,  and  overwrought  as  he  frequently 
found  himself,  the  repose  of  the  place  was 
helpful  to  him.  In  1842  he  again  visited  Eu 
rope,  for  the  third  time.  His  health  suffered 
from  solitude  and  the  continued  activities  of  his 
mind.  "I  sometimes  think,"  he  said,  "that  no 
one  with  a  head  and  a  heart  can  be  perfectly 
well."  Therefore  in  the  spring  he  obtained 
leave  of  absence  for  six  months,  and  went 
abroad  to  try  the  water  cure  at  Marienberg. 
One  of  the  chief  events  of  this  journey  was 
the  beginning  of  his  friendship  with  Freiligrath. 
The  two  men  never  met  again  face  to  face,  but 
they  began  a  correspondence  which  only  ended 
with  their  lives.  It  is  in  one  of  his  letters  to 
Freiligrath  that  he  writes  :  "  Be  true  to  your 
self  and  burn  like  a  watch-fire  afar  off  there  in 
your  Germany."  His  mind  was  full  of  poems  ; 
much  of  his  future  work  was  projected  although 
little  was  completed.  He  wrote  one  sonnet 
called  "  Mezzo  Cammin,"  never  printed  until 
after  his  death  ;  perhaps  he  thought  it  too  ex 
pressive  of  personal  sadness. 


22  LONGFELLOW 

Upon  the  return  voyage,  which  was  a  stormy 
one,  he  accomplished  a  feat  that  many  a  storm- 
tossed  traveler  would  consider  marvelous  in 
deed.  "  Not  out  of  my  berth,"  he  wrote,  "  more 
than  twelve  hours  the  first  twelve  days.  There 
cabined,  cribbed,  confined,  I  passed  fifteen  days. 
During  this  time  I  wrote  seven  poems  on  sla 
very.  I  meditated  upon  them  in  the  stormy, 
sleepless  nights,  and  wrote  them  down  with  a 
pencil  in  the  morning.  A  small  window  in  the 
side  of  the  vessel  admitted  light  into  my  berth, 
and  there  I  lay  on  my  back  and  soothed  my 
soul  with  songs."  These  poems,  with  one  added 
as  a  dedication  to  Dr.  Channing,  "  threw  the 
author's  influence  on  the  side  against  slavery ; 
and  at  that  time  it  was  a  good  deal  simply  to 
take  that  unpopular  side  publicly." 

He  took  up  his  correspondence  at  this  period 
with  renewed  fervor,  and  what  other  life  can 
show  such  devotion  to  friendship  or  such  a 
circle  of  friends  ?  Through  good  report  and 
evil  report  his  friends  were  dear  to  him,  and 
the  disparagements  of  others  failed  to  reach 
the  ear  of  his  heart.  In  one  of  his  letters  to 
G.  W.  Greene  he  says  :  "It  is  of  great  impor 
tance  to  a  man  to  know  how  he  stands  with 
his  friends ;  at  least,  I  think  so.  The  voice  of 
a  friend  has  a  wonder-working  power ;  and  from 
the  very  hour  we  hear  it,  'the  fever  leaves  us.'  " 

Upon  his  return  home  in  December,  1836,  he 
began  his  life  in  Cambridge  among  the  group 


LONGFELLOW  23 

of  men  who  became  inseparable  friends,  —  Fel- 
ton,  Sumner,  Hillard,  and  Cleveland.  They 
called  themselves  the  "  Five  of  Clubs,"  and 
saw  each  other  continually.  Later  came  Agas- 
siz  and  a  few  others.  How  delightful  the  little 
suppers  were  of  those  days  !  He  used  to  write  : 
"  We  had  a gaudiolum last  night."  When,  sev 
eral  years  after,  he  married  Frances  Appleton 
and  began,  as  it  were,  "the  new  life,"  his  wife 
wrote  to  Mr.  Greene  :  "  Felton  and  the  rest  of 
the  club  flourish  in  immortal  youth,  and  are 
often  with  us  to  dine  or  sup.  I  have  never 
seen  such  a  beautiful  friendship  between  men 
of  such  distinct  personalities,  though  closely 
linked  together  by  mutual  tastes  and  affec 
tions.  They  criticise  and  praise  each  other's 
performances,  with  a  frankness  not  to  be  sur 
passed,  and  seem  to  have  attained  that  happy 
height  of  faith  where  no  misunderstanding,  no 
jealousy,  no  reserve,  exists."  It  appears,  how 
ever,  that  even  these  delightful  friendships  had 
left  something  to  be  desired.  In  his  journal 
he  wrote  :  "  Came  back  to  Cambridge  and  went 
to  Mr.  Norton's.  There  I  beheld  what  perfect 
happiness  may  exist  on  this  earth,  and  felt  how 
I  stood  alone  in  life,  cut  off  for  a  while  from 
those  dearest  sympathies  for  which  I  long." 
His  brother  said  of  him  that  having  known  the 
happiness  of  domestic  life  for  which  his  nature 
was  especially  formed,  "  he  felt  the  need  of  more 
intimate  affection."  Thus,  after  many  years  of 


24  LONGFELLOW 

lonely  wandering,  another  period  of  Longfel 
low's  life  opened  with  his  marriage  in  1843. 
Had  he  himself  been  writing  of  another,  he 
might  have  divided  his  story  into  cantos,  each 
one  with  a  separate  theme.  One  of  aspiration, 
one  of  endeavor,  one  with  the  despair  of  young 
sorrow,  and  one  of  triumphant  love.  Advan 
cing  thus  through  the  gamut  of  human  expe 
rience  he  might  have  closed  the  scene  with  the 
immortal  line  loved  of  all  poets  :  — 

"  In  sua  voluntade  e  nostra  pace." 

Thus  indeed,  reviewing  Longfellow's  life  as 
a  whole,  we  discern  his  days  to  be  crowded 
with  incident  and  experience.  Every  condition 
of  human  life  presented  itself  at  his  door,  and 
every  human  being  found  a  welcome  there,  — 
incidents  and  experience  coming  as  frequently 
to  him  through  the  lives  of  others  as  through 
the  gate  of  his  own  being.  The  note  of  love 
and  unity  with  the  Divine  will  was  the  domi 
nant  one  which  controlled  his  spirit  and  gave 
him  calm. 

He  early  chose  Craigie  House  as  the  most 
desirable  place  for  his  abode  in  all  the  world. 
The  poems  and  journals  are  full  of  his  enjoy 
ment  of  nature  as  seen  from  its  windows.  In 
the  beginning  of  his  residence  there  he  per 
suaded  Mrs.  Craigie  to  allow  him  to  have  two 
rooms ;  but  he  soon  controlled  the  second  floor, 
and  at  the  time  of  his  marriage  to  Miss  Apple- 


LONGFELLOW  25 

ton  her  father  presented  them  with  the  whole 
of  the  beautiful  estate. 

Here  his  life  took  shape  and  his  happiness 
found  increase  with  the  days.  It  was  like  him 
to  say  little  in  direct  speech  of  all  this ;  but  we 
find  a  few  words  describing  his  wife,  of  whom 
his  brother  wrote  that  "her  calm  and  quiet 
face  wore  habitually  a  look  of  seriousness." 
And  then  evidently  quoting  from  Henry,  he 
adds,  "  at  times  it  seemed  to  make  the  very 
air  bright  with  its  smiles."  She  was  a  beautiful 
woman  of  deep  but  reserved  feeling  and  cul 
tivated  tastes  and  manners.  She  understood 
and  sympathized  in  his  work,  and,  even  more, 
she  became  often  its  inspiration.  During  their 
wedding  journey  they  passed  through  Spring 
field,  whence  she  wrote  :  "  In  the  Arsenal  at 
Springfield  we  grew  quite  warlike  against  war, 
and  I  urged  H.  to  write  a  peace  poem." 

Finally  established  in  Craigie  House,  as  the 
children  grew  and  his  library  enlarged,  and 
guests,  attracted  by  personal  love  and  by  his 
fame,  became  more  numerous,  he  found  the 
days  almost  overburdened  with  responsibilities. 
He  wrote  one  day  to  Charles  Sumner  :  "  What 
you  quote  about  the  plre  de  famille  is  pretty 
true.  It  is  a  difficult  role  to  play  ;  particularly 
when,  as  in  my  case,  it  is  united  with  that  of 
oncle  d ' Amtrique  and  general  superintendent 
of  all  the  dilapidated  and  tumble-down  foreign 
ers  who  pass  this  way ! "  The  regulation  of 


26  LONGFELLOW 

such  a  house  in  New  England  was  far  more  diffi 
cult  than  it  is  at  present,  and  Cambridge  farther 
away  from  Boston,  with  its  conveniences  and 
privileges,  than  appeared.  What  anxieties  if  the 
hourly  omnibus  should  be  crowded  !  and  what 
a  pleasant  slow  ride  into  the  far  green  land  it 
seemed  ! 

Nevertheless,  this  was  his  chosen  home,  his 
house  beautiful,  and  such  he  made  it,  not  only 
to  his  own  eyes,  but  to  the  eyes  of  all  who  fre 
quented  it.  The  atmosphere  of  the  man  per 
vaded  his  surroundings  and  threw  a  glamour 
over  everything.  Even  those  who  were  most 
intimate  at  Craigie  House  felt  the  indescriba 
ble  influence  of  tenderness,  sweetness,  and  calm 
which  filled  the  place.  Neither  Longfellow  nor 
his  wife  was  a  brilliant  talker;  indeed,  there 
were  often  periods  of  speechlessness ;  but  in 
spite  of  mental  absences,  a  habit  of  which  he 
got  the  better  in  later  years,  one  was  always 
sure  of  being  taken  at  one's  best  and  of  com 
ing  away  with  a  sense  of  having  "  breathed  a 
nobler  air." 

"  Society  and  hospitality  meant  something 
real  to  him,"  his  eldest  daughter  writes.  "  I 
cannot  remember  that  there  were  ever  any  for 
mal  or  obligatory  occasions  of  entertainment. 
All  who  came  were  made  welcome  without  any 
special  preparation,  and  without  any  thought  of 
personal  inconvenience." 

The  decorations  and  splendors  of  the  great 


LONGFELLOW  27 

world  neither  existed  nor  were  needed  there. 
His  orange-tree, "that  busie  plant,"  always  stood 
in  his  study  window,  and  remains,  still  cherished, 
to-day.  The  statuette  of  Goethe,  to  which  he 
refers  in  "Hyperion,"  stands  yet  on  the  high 
desk  at  which  he  stood  to  write,  and  books 
are  everywhere.  Even  closets  supposed  to  be 
devoted  to  pails  and  dust-cloths  "  have  three 
shelves  for  books  and  one  for  pails."  In  his 
own  bedroom,  where  the  exquisite  portrait  of  his 
wife  by  Rowse  hangs  over  the  fireplace,  there 
is  a  small  bookcase  near  his  bed  which  con 
tains  a  choice  collection  of  the  English  poets. 
Vaughan,  Henry  King,  and  others  of  that  lovely 
company  of  the  past.  These  were  his  most 
intimate  friends.  In  the  copy  of  Henry  King, 
I  found  the  following  lines  marked  by  him  in 
"  The  Exequy  :  "  — 

"  Sleep  on,  my  love,  in  thy  cold  bed, 
Never  to  be  disquieted ! 
My  last  good-night !     Thou  wilt  not  wake, 
Till  I  thy  fate  shall  overtake  ; 
Till  age,  or  grief,  or  sickness,  must 
Marry  my  body  to  the  dust 
It  so  much  loves." 

His  daughter  says,  "This  library  was  carefully 
arranged  by  subjects ;  and  although  no  catalogue 
was  ever  made,  he  was  never  at  a  loss  where  to 
look  for  any  needed  volume.  His  books  were 
deeply  beloved  and  tenderly  handled." 

Such  was  Craigie  House  and  such  was  the 
poet's  life  within  it  from  the  beginning  to  the 


28  LONGFELLOW 

end.  "  His  poetry  was  not  worked  out  from 
his  brain,"  his  daughter  again  writes,  and  who 
should  know  better  than  herself  !  "  it  was  the 
blossoming  of  his  inward  life." 

In  a  brief  paper  upon  Longfellow  written  by 
Mr.  William  Winter  I  find  the  universal  senti 
ment  towards  him  more  fully  and  tenderly  ex 
pressed,  perhaps,  than  elsewhere.  Mr.  Winter 
writes  :  "  I  had  read  every  line  he  had  then  pub 
lished  ;  and  such  was  the  affection  he  inspired, 
even  in  a  boyish  mind,  that  on  many  a  summer 
night  I  have  walked  several  miles  to  his  house, 
only  to  put  my  hand  upon  the  latch  of  his  gate, 
which  he  himself  had  touched.  More  than  any 
one  else  among  the  many  famous  persons  whom, 
since  then,  it  has  been  my  fortune  to  know,  he 
aroused  this  feeling  of  mingled  tenderness  and 
reverence." 

The  description  of  his  person,  too,  as  given 
by  Mr,  Winter,  seems  to  me  clearer  and  closer 
to  the  truth  than  any  other  I  have  chanced  to 
see. 

4t  His  dignity  and  grace,  and  the  beautiful  re 
finement  of  his  countenance,  together  with  his 
perfect  taste  in  dress  and  the  exquisite  simpli 
city  of  his  manners,  made  him  the  absolute  ideal 
of  what  a  poet  should  be.  His  voice,  too,  was 
soft,  sweet,  and  musical,  and,  like  his  face,  it  had 
the  innate  charm  of  tranquillity.  His  eyes  were 
blue-gray,  very  bright  and  brave,  changeable 
under  the  influence  of  emotion  (as  afterward  I 


LONGFELLOW  29 

often  saw),  but  mostly  calm,  grave,  attentive, 
and  gentle.  The  habitual  expression  of  his  face 
was  not  that  of  sadness  ;  and  yet  it  was  pensive. 
Perhaps  it  may  be  best  described  as  that  of 
serious  and  tender  thoughtfulness.  He  had 
conquered  his  own  sorrows  thus  far ;  but  the 
sorrows  of  others  threw  their  shadow  over  him. 
.  .  .  There  was  a  strange  touch  of  sorrowful  ma 
jesty  and  prophetic  fortitude  commingled  with 
the  composure  and  kindness  of  his  features.  .  .  . 
His  spontaneous  desire,  the  natural  instinct  of 
his  great  heart,  was  to  be  helpful,  —  to  lift  up 
the  lowly,  to  strengthen  the  weak,  to  bring  out 
the  best  in  every  person,  to  dry  every  tear,  and 
make  every  pathway  smooth." 

Although  naturally  of  a  buoyant  disposition 
and  fond  of  pleasure,  Longfellow  lived  as  far 
as  possible  from  the  public  eye,  especially  dur 
ing  the  last  twenty  years  of  his  life.  The  fol 
lowing  note  gives  a  hint  of  his  natural  gayety, 
and  details  one  of  the  many  excuses  by  which 
he  always  declined  to  speak  in  public  ;  the  one 
memorable  exception  being  that  beautiful  occa 
sion  at  Bowdoin,  when  he  returned  in  age  to 
the  scenes  of  his  youth  and  read  to  the  crowd 
assembled  there  to  do  him  reverence  his  poem 
entitled  "  Morituri  Salutamus."  After  speak 
ing  of  the  reasons  which  must  keep  him  from 
the  Burns  festival,  he  adds  :  — 

"  I  am  very  sorry  not  to  be  there.  You  will 
have  a  delightful  supper,  or  dinner,  whichever 


\ 


30  LONGFELLOW 

it  is ;  and  human  breath  enough  expended  to 
fill  all  the  trumpets  of  Iskander  for  a  month  or 
more. 

"  I  behold  as  in  a  vision  a  friend  of  ours, 
with  his  left  hand  under  the  tails  of  his  coat, 
blowing  away  like  mad  ;  and  alas !  I  shall  not 
be  there  to  applaud.  All  this  you  must  do  for 
me ;  and  also  eat  my  part  of  the  haggis,  which 
I  hear  is  to  grace  the  feast.  This  shall  be  your 
duty  and  your  reward." 

The  reference  in  this  note  to  the  trumpets  of 
Iskander  is  the  only  one  in  his  letters  regarding 
a  poem  which  was  a  great  favorite  of  his,  by 
Leigh  Hunt,  called  "  The  Trumpets  of  Dool- 
karnein."  It  is  a  poem  worthy  to  make  the 
reputation  of  a  poet,  and  is  almost  a  surprise 
even  among  the  varied  riches  of  Leigh  Hunt. 
Many  years  after  this  note  was  written,  Long 
fellow  used  to  recall  it  to  those  lovers  of  poetry 
who  had  chanced  to  escape  a  knowledge  of  its 
beauty. 

In  spite  of  his  dislike  of  grand  occasions 
where  he  was  a  prominent  figure,  he  was  a  keen 
lover  of  the  opera  and  theatre.  He  was  always 
the  first  to  know  when  the  opera  season  was  to 
begin  and  to  plan  that  our  two  houses  might 
take  a  box  together.  He  was  always  ready  to 
hear  "  Lucia  "  or  "  Don  Giovanni,"  and  to  make 
a  festival  time  at  the  coming  of  Salvini  or  Neil- 
son.  There  is  a  tiny  notelet  among  his  letters, 
with  a  newspaper  paragraph  neatly  cut  out  and 


LONGFELLOW  31 

pasted  across  the  top,  detailing  the  names  of 
his  party  at  a  previous  appearance  at  a  theatre, 
a  kind  of  notoriety  which  he  particularly  shud 
dered  at ;  but  in  order  to  prove  his  determina 
tion  in  spite  of  everything,  he  writes  below :  — 

"  Now  for  '  Pinafore/  and  another  paragraph  ! 
Saturday  afternoon  would  be  a  good  time." 

He  easily  caught  the  gayety  of  such  occa 
sions,  and  in  the  shadow  of  the  curtains  in  the 
box  would  join  in  the  singing  or  the  recitative 
of  the  lovely  Italian  words  with  a  true  poet's 
delight. 

The  strange  incidents  of  a  life  subject  to  the 
taskmaster  Popularity  are  endless.  One  day  he 
wrote  :  • — 

"  A  stranger  called  here  and  asked  if  Shake 
speare  lived  in  this  neighborhood.  I  told  him 
I  knew  no  such  person.  Do  you  ? " 

Day  by  day  he  was  besieged  by  every  possi 
ble  form  of  interruption  which  the  ingenuity  of 
the  human  brain  could  devise  ;  but  his  patience 
and  kindness,  his  determination  to  accept  the 
homage  offered  him  in  the  spirit  of  the  giver, 
whatever  discomfort  it  might  bring  himself,  was 
continually  surprising  to  those  who  observed 
him  year  by  year.  Mr.  Fields  wrote  :  "  In  his 
modesty  and  benevolence  I  am  reminded  of 
what  Pope  said  of  his  friend  Garth  :  '  He  is  the 
best  of  Christians  without  knowing  it/ ' 

In  one  of  Longfellow's  notes  he  alludes  hu 
morously  to  the  autograph  nuisance  :  — 


32  LONGFELLOW 

"  Do  you  know  how  to  apply  properly  for 
autographs  ?  Here  is  a  formula  I  have  just  re 
ceived,  on  a  postal  card  :  — 

"  *  DEAR  SIR  :  As  I  am  getting  a  collection 
of  the  autographs  of  all  honorable  and  worthy 
men,  and  think  yours  such,  I  hope  you  will  for 
feit  by  next  mail.  Yours,  etc.' " 

And  of  that  other  nuisance,  sitting  for  a  por 
trait,  he  laughingly  wrote  one  day :  "  '  Two  or 
three  sittings  '  —  that  is  the  illusory  phrase. 
Two  or  three  sittings  have  become  a  standing 
joke."  And  yet  how  seldom  he  declined  when 
it  was  in  his  power  to  serve  an  artist !  His 
generosity  knew  no  bounds. 

When  a  refusal  of  any  kind  was  necessary, 
it  was  wonderful  to  see  how  gently  it  was  ex 
pressed.  A  young  person  having  written  from 
a  western  city  to  request  him  to  write  a  poem 
for  her  class,  he  said :  "  I  could  not  write  it, 
but  tried  to  say  '  No  '  so  softly  that  she  would 
think  it  better  than  <  Yes/  " 

He  was  distinguished  by  one  grace  which  was 
almost  peculiar  to  himself  in  the  time  in  which 
he  lived  — his  tenderness  toward  the  undevel 
oped  artist,  the  man  or  woman,  youth  or  maid, 
whose  heart  was  set  upon  some  form  of  ideal  ex 
pression,  and  who  was  living  for  that.  Whether 
they  possessed  the  power  to  distinguish  them 
selves  or  not,  to  such  persons  he  addressed  him 
self  with  a  sense  of  personal  regard  and  kin 
ship.  When  fame  crowned  the  aspirant,  no 


LONGFELLOW  33 

one  recognized  more  keenly  the  perfection  of 
the  work,  but  he  seldom  turned  aside  to  at 
tract  the  successful  to  himself.  To  the  unsuc 
cessful  he  lent  the  sunshine  and  overflow  of  his 
own  life,  as  if  he  tried  to  show  every  day  afresh 
that  he  believed  noble  pursuit  and  not  attain 
ment  to  be  the  purpose  of  our  existence. 

In  a  letter  written  in  1 860  Longfellow  says  :  — 

"  I  have  no  end  of  poems  sent  me  for  candid 
judgment  and  opinion.  Four  cases  on  hand  at 
this  moment.  A  large  folio  came  last  night 
from  a  lady.  It  has  been  chasing  me  round 
the  country ;  has  been  in  East  Cambridge  and 
in  West  Cambridge,  and  finally  came  by  the 

hands  of  Policeman  S to  my  house.  I  wish 

he  had  waived  examination,  and  committed  it 
(to  memory).  What  shall  I  do  ?  These  poems 
weaken  me  very  much.  It  is  like  so  much 
water  added  to  the  Spirit  of  Poetry." 

And  again  he  writes  :  — 

"I  received  this  morning  a  poem  with  the 
usual  request  to  give  '  my  real  opinion  '  of  it.  I 
give  you  one  stanza." 

After  quoting  the  verse  and  giving  the  sub 
ject  of  the  poem,  he  continues  :  — 

"  In  his  letter  the  author  says,  '  I  did  so 
much  better  on  poetry  than  I  thought  I  could 
as  a  beginner,  that  I  really  have  felt  a  little 
proud  of  my  poems/  He  also  sends  me  his 
photograph  'at  sixty-five  years  of  age/  and  asks 
for  mine  '  and  a  poem '  in  return.  I  had  much 


34  LONGFELLOW 

rather  send  him  these  than  my  'real  opinion/ 
which  I  shall  never  make  known  to  any  man, 
except  on  compulsion  and  under  the  seal  of 
secrecy." 

His  kindness  and  love  of  humor  carried  him 
through  many  a  tedious  interruption.  He  gen 
erously  overlooked  the  fact  of  the  subterfuges 
to  which  men  and  women  resorted  in  order  to 
get  an  interview,  and  to  help  them  out  made 
as  much  of  their  excuses  as  possible.  Speaking 
one  day  of  the  persons  who  came  to  see  him  at 
Nahant,  he  said  :  "  One  man,  a  perfect  stranger, 
came  with  an  omnibus  full  of  ladies.  He  de 
scended,  introduced  himself,  then  returning  to 
the  omnibus  took  out  all  the  ladies,  one,  two, 
three,  four,  and  five,  with  a  little  girl,  and 
brought  them  in.  I  entertained  them  to  the 
best  of  my  ability,  and  they  stayed  an  hour. 
They  had  scarcely  gone  when  a  forlorn  woman 
in  black  came  up  to  me  on  the  piazza,  and  asked 
for  a  dipper  of  water.  '  Certainly,'  I  replied, 
and  went  to  fetch  her  a  glass.  When  I  brought 
it  she  said,  'There  is  another  woman  just  by 
the  fence  who  is  tired  and  thirsty  ;  I  will  carry 
this  to  her.'  But  she  struck  her  head  as  she 
passed  through  the  window  and  spilled  the 
water  on  the  piazza.  '  Oh,  what  have  I  done  ! ' 
she  said.  '  If  I  had  a  floor-cloth,  I  would  wipe 
it  up.'  'Oh,  no  matter  about  the  water,'  I  said, 
'  if  you  have  not  hurt  yourself.'  Then  I  went 
and  brought  more  water  for  them  both,  and 


LONGFELLOW  35 

sent  them  on  their  way,  at  last,  refreshed  and 
rejoicing."  Once  Longfellow  drew  out  of  his 
pocket  a  queer  request  for  an  autograph,  saying 
"  that  the  writer  loved  poetry  in  most  any  style, 
and  would  he  please  copy  his  *  Break,  break, 
break '  for  the  writer  ?  "  He  also  described 
in  a  note  a  little  encounter  in  the  street,  on 
a  windy  day,  with  an  elderly  French  gentle 
man  in  company  with  a  young  lady,  who  intro 
duced  them  to  each  other.  The  Frenchman 
said  :  — 

"  '  Monsieur,  vous  avez  un  fils  qui  fait  de  la 
peinture.' 

"'Oui,  monsieur.' 

"  '  II  a  du  merite.     II  a  beaucoup  d'avenir.' 

"'Ah,'  said  I,  'c'est  une  belle  chose  que 
1'avenir.' 

"  The  elderly  French  gentleman  rolled  up  the 
whites  of  his  eyes  and  answered  :  — 

" '  Oui,  c'est  une  belle  chose ;  mais  vous  et 
moi,  nous  n'en  avons  pas  beaucoup  ! ' 

"Superfluous  information  !  —  H.  W.  L." 

It  would  be  both  an  endless  and  unprofit 
able  task  to  recall  more  of  the  curious  expe 
riences  which  popularity  brought  down  upon 
him.  There  is  a  passage  among  Mr.  Fields's 
notes,  however,  in  which  he  describes  an  inci 
dent  during  Longfellow's  last  visit  to  England, 
which  should  not  be  overlooked.  Upon  his 
arrival,  the  Queen  sent  a  graceful  message, 
and  invited  him  to  Windsor  Castle,  where  she 


36  LONGFELLOW 

received  him  with  all  the  honors  ;  but  he  told 
me  no  foreign  tribute  touched  him  deeper  than 
the  words  of  an  English  hod-carrier,  who  came 
up  to  the  carriage  door  at  Harrow,  and  asked 
permission  to  take  the  hand  of  the  man  who 
had  written  the  "Voices  of  the  Night." 

There  was  no  break  nor  any  change  in  the 
friendship  with  his  publisher  during  the  pass 
ing  of  the  years;  but  in  1861  there  is  a  note 
containing  only  a  few  words,  which  shows  that 
a  change  had  fallen  upon  Longfellow  himself,  a 
shadow  which  never  could  be  lifted  from  his 
life.  He  writes  :  — 

"  MY  DEAR  FIELDS,  —  I  am  sorry  to  say  No 
instead  of  Yes  ;  but  so  it  must  be.  I  can  nei 
ther  write  nor  think ;  and  I  have  nothing  fit  to 
send  you  but  my  love,  which  you  cannot  put 
into  the  magazine." 

For  ever  after  the  death  of  his  wife  he  was 
a  different  man.  His  friends  suffered  for  him 
and  with  him,  but  he  walked  alone  through  the 
valley  of  the  shadow  of  death.  "  The  blow  fell 
entirely  without  warning,  and  the  burial  took 
place  upon  the  anniversary  of  her  marriage  day. 
Some  hand  placed  on  her  beautiful  head,  lovely 
and  unmarred  in  death,  a  wreath  of  orange  blos 
soms." 

There  was  a  break  in  his  journal  at  this  time. 
After  many  days  he  inscribed  in  it  the  follow 
ing  lines  from  Tennyson's  poem  addressed  to 
James  Spedding :  — 


LONGFELLOW  37 

"  Sleep  sweetly,  tender  heart,  in  peace. 

Sleep,  holy  spirit,  blessed  soul ! 
While  the  stars  burn,  the  moons  increase, 
And  the  great  ages  onward  roll." 

His  friends  were  glad  when  he  turned  to  his 
work  again,  and  still  more  glad  when  he  showed 
a  desire  for  their  interest  in  what  he  was  doing. 

It  was  not  long  before  he  began  to  busy 
himself  continuously  with  his  translation  of  the 
"Divina  Commedia,"  and  in  my  diary  of  1863, 
two  years  later,  I  find  :  — 

"August.  —  A  delightful  day  with  Longfel 
low  at  Nahant.  He  read  aloud  the  last  part  of 
his  new  volume  of  poems,  in  which  each  one  of 
a  party  of  friends  tells  a  story.  Ole  Bull,  Par 
sons,  Monti,  and  several  other  characters  are 
introduced." 

"  September  1st.  —  A  cold  storm  by  the  sea 
shore,  but  there  was  great  pleasure  in  town 
in  the  afternoon.  Longfellow,  Paine,  Dwight, 
and  Fields  went  to  hear  Walcker  play  the 
new  organ  in  the  Music  Hall  for  the  first  time 
since  its  erection.  Afterwards  they  all  dined  to 
gether.  Longfellow  comes  in  from  Cambridge 
every  day,  and  sometimes  twice  a  day,  to  see 
George  Sumner,  who  is  dying  at  the  Massachu 
setts  General  Hospital." 

"September  igth.  —  Longfellow  and  his 
friend  George  W.  Greene,  Charles  Sumner,  and 
Dempster  the  singer,  came  in  for  an  early  din 
ner.  A  very  cosy,  pleasant  little  party.  The 


38  LONGFELLOW 

afternoon  was  cool,  and  everybody  was  in  kindly 
humor.  Sumner  shook  his  head  sadly  when  the 
subj  ect  of  the  English  iron-clads  was  mentioned. 
The  talk  prolonged  itself  upon  the  condition  of 
the  country.  Longfellow's  patriotism  flamed. 
His  feeling  against  England  runs  more  deeply 
and  strongly  than  he  can  find  words  to  express. 
There  is  no  prejudice  nor  childish  partisanship, 
but  it  is  hatred  of  the  course  she  has  pursued 
at  this  critical  time.  Later,  in  speaking  of  po 
etry  and  some  of  the  less  known  and  -younger 
poets,  Longfellow  recalled  some  good  passages 
in  the  poems  of  Bessie  Parkes  and  Jean  Inge- 
low.  As  evening  approached  we  left  the  table 
and  came  to  the  library.  There  in  the  twilight 
Dempster  sat  at  the  piano  and  sang  to  us,  be 
ginning  with  Longfellow's  poem  called  '  Chil 
dren/  which  he  gave  with  a  delicacy  and  feeling 
that  touched  every  one.  Afterwards  he  sang 
the  '  Bugle  Song  '  and  '  Turn,  Fortune/  which 
he  had  shortly  before  leaving  England  sung  to 
Tennyson  ;  and  then  after  a  pause  he  turned 
once  more  to  the  instrument  and  sang  *  Break, 
break,  break.'  It  was  very  solemn,  and  no  one 
spoke  when  he  had  finished,  only  a  deep  sob  was 
heard  from  the  corner  where  Longfellow  sat. 
Again  and  again,  each  time  more  uncontrolled, 
we  heard  the  heartrending  sounds.  Presently 
the  singer  gave  us  another  and  less  touching 
song,  and  before  he  ceased  Longfellow  rose 
and  vanished  from  the  room  in  the  dim  light 
without  a  word." 


LONGFELLOW  39 

"  September  2/th.  —  Longfellow  and  Greene 
came  in  town  in  the  evening  for  a  walk  and 
to  see  the  moonlight  in  the  streets,  and  after 
wards  to  have  supper.  ...  He  was  very  sad, 
and  seemed  to  have  grown  an  old  man  since  a 
week  ago.  He  was  silent  and  absent-minded. 
On  his  previous  visit  he  had  borrowed  Sidney's 
'  Arcadia '  and  Christina  Rossetti's  poems,  but 
he  had  read  neither  of  the  books.  He  was  over 
whelmed  with  his  grief,  as  if  it  were  sometimes 
more  than  he  could  endure." 

"  Sunday,  October.  —  Took  five  little  children 
to  drive  in  the  afternoon,  and  stopped  at  Long 
fellow's.  It  was  delightful  to  see  their  enjoy 
ment  and  his.  He  took  them  out  of  the  car 
riage  in  his  arms  and  was  touchingly  kind  to 
them.  His  love  for  children  is  not  confined  to 
his  poetic  expressions  or  to  his  own  family ;  he 
is  uncommonly  tender  and  beautiful  with  them 
always." 

I  remember  there  was  one  little  boy  of  whom 
he  was  very  fond,  and  who  came  often  to  see 
him.  One  day  the  child  looked  earnestly  at  the 
long  rows  of  books  in  the  library,  and  at  length 
said  :  — 

"  Have  you  got  '  Jack  the  Giant-Killer '  ?  " 

Longfellow  was  obliged  to  confess  that  his 
library  did  not  contain  that  venerated  volume. 
The  little  boy  looked  very  sorry,  and  presently 
slipped  down  from  his  knee  and  went  away; 
but  early  the  next  morning  Longfellow  saw 


40  LONGFELLOW 

him  coming  up  the  walk  with  something  tightly 
clasped  in  his  little  fists.  The  child  had  brought 
him  two  cents  with  which  he  was  to  buy  a  "  Jack 
the  Giant-Killer  "  to  be  his  own. 

He  did  not  escape  the  sad  experiences  of  the 
war.  His  eldest  son  was  severely  wounded,  and 
he  also  went,  as  did  Dr.  Holmes  and  other  less 
famous  but  equally  anxious  parents,  in  search  of 
his  boy. 

The  diary  continues  :  — 

"  December  itfh. — Went  to  pass  the  after 
noon  with  Longfellow,  and  found  his  son  able 
to  walk  about  a  little.  He  described  his  own 
arrival  at  a  railway  station  south  of  Washington. 
He  found  no  one  there  but  a  rough-looking 
officer,  who  was  walking  up  and  down  the  plat 
form.  At  each  turn  he  regarded  Longfellow, 
and  at  length  came  up,  and  taking  his  hand  said  : 

"  '  Is  this  Professor  Longfellow  ?  It  was  I 
who  translated  "  Hiawatha  "  into  Russian.  I 
have  come  to  this  country  to  fight  for  the 
Union.' " 

In  the  year  1865  began  those  Wednesday 
evenings  devoted  to  reading  the  new  transla 
tion  of  Dante.  They  were  delightful  occasions. 
Lowell,  Norton,  Greene,  Howells,  and  such 
other  Dante  scholars  or  intimate  friends  as  were 
accessible,  made  up  the  circle  of  kindly  critics. 
Those  evenings  increased  in  interest  as  the 
work  progressed,  and  when  it  was  ended  and 
the  notes  written  and  read,  it  was  proposed  to 


LONGFELLOW  41 

re-read  the  whole  rather  than  to  give  up  the 
weekly  visit  to  Longfellow's  house.  In  1866 
he  wrote  to  Mr.  Fields  :  — 

"  Greene  is  coming  expressly  to  hear  the  last 
canto  of  '  Paradiso '  to-morrow  night,  and  will 
stay  the  rest  of  the  week.  I  really  hoped  you 
would  be  here,  but  as  you  say  nothing  about  it 
I  begin  to  tremble.  Perhaps,  however,  you  are 
only  making  believe  and  will  take  us  by  sur 
prise.  So  I  shall  keep  your  place  for  you. 

"  This  is  not  to  be  the  end  of  all  things.  I 
mean  to  begin  again  in  September  with  the  du 
bious  and  difficult  passages  ;  and  if  you  are  not 
in  too  much  of  a  hurry  to  publish,  there  is  still 
a  long  vista  of  pleasant  evenings  stretching  out 
before  us.  We  can  pull  them  out  like  a  spy 
glass.  I  am  shutting  up  now  to  recommence 
the  operation." 

In  December  of  the  same  year  he  wrote  :  — 

"  The  first  meeting  of  the  Dante  Club  Redi- 
vivus  is  on  Wednesday  next.  Come  and  be 
bored.  Please  not  to  mention  the  subject  to 
any  one  yet  awhile,  as  we  are  going  to  be  very 
quiet  about  it." 

"January,  1867.  —  Dante  Club  at  Longfel 
low's  again.  They  are  revising  the  whole  book 
with  the  minutest  care.  Lowell's  accuracy  is 
surprising  and  of  great  value  to  the  work  ;  also 
Norton's  criticisms.  Longfellow  stands  apart 
at  his  desk  taking  notes  and  making  corrections, 
though  of  course  no  one  can  know  yet  what  he 
accepts." 


42  LONGFELLOW 

Longfellow's  true  life  was  that  of  a  scholar 
and  a  dreamer ;  everything  else  was  a  duty, 
however  pleasurable  or  beautiful  the  experi 
ence  might  become  in  his  gentle  acceptation. 
He  was  seldom  stimulated  to  external  expres 
sion  by  others.  Such  excitement  as  he  could 
express  again  was  always  self -excitement ;  any 
thing  external  rendered  him  at  once  a  listener 
and  an  observer.  For  this  reason  it  is  pecu 
liarly  difficult  to  give  any  idea  of  his  lovely 
presence  and  character  to  those  who  have  not 
known  him.  He  did  not  speak  in  epigrams.  It 
could  not  be  said  of  him,  — 

"  His  mouth  he  could  not  ope, 
But  out  there  flew  a  trope." 

Yet  there  was  an  exquisite  tenderness  and  efflu 
ence  from  his  presence  which  was  more  human 
izing  and  elevating  than  the  eloquence  of  many 
others. 

One  quotation  from  a  letter  to  Charles  Sum- 
ner  is  too  characteristic  to  be  omitted  even  in 
the  slightest  sketch  of  Longfellow.  He  writes  : 
"  You  are  hard  at  work  ;  and  God  bless  you  in 
it.  In  every  country  the  '  dangerous  classes  ' 
are  those  who  do  no  work  ;  for  instance,  the  no 
bility  in  Europe  and  the  slaveholders  here.  It 
is  evident  that  the  world  needs  a  new  nobility, 
—  not  of  the  gold  medal  and  sangre  azul  order ; 
not  of  the  blood  that  is  blue  because  it  stag 
nates,  but  of  the  red  arterial  blood  that  circu 
lates,  and  has  heart  in  it  and  life  and  labor." 


LONGFELLOW  43 

Speaking  one  day  of  his  own  reminiscences, 
Longfellow  said,  that  "  however  interesting  such 
things  were  in  conversation,  he  thought  they 
seldom  contained  legitimate  matter  for  book- 
making;  and  's  life  of  a  poet,  just  then 

printed,  was,  he  thought,  peculiarly  disagree 
able  chiefly  because  of  the  unjustifiable  things 
related  of  him  by  others.  This  strain  of  thought 
brought  to  his  mind  a  call  he  once  made  with 
a  letter  of  introduction,  when  a  youth  in  Paris, 
upon  Jules  Janin.  The  servant  said  her  master 
was  at  home,  and  he  was  ushered  immediately 
into  a  small  parlor,  in  one  corner  of  which  was 
a  winding  stairway  leading  into  the  room  above. 
Here  he  waited  a  moment  while  the  maid  car 
ried  in  his  card,  and  then  returned  immediately 
to  say  he  could  go  up.  In  the  upper  room  sat 
Janin  under  the  hands  of  a  barber,  his  abun 
dant  locks  shaken  up  in  wild  confusion,  in  spite 
of  which  he  received  his  guest,  quite  undis 
turbed,  as  if  it  were  a  matter  of  course.  There 
was  no  fire  in  the  room  ;  but  the  fireplace  was 
heaped  with  letters  and  envelopes,  and  a  trail  of 
the  same  reached  from  his  desk  to  the  grate. 
After  a  brief  visit  Longfellow  was  about  to  with 
draw,  when  Janin  detained  him,  saying  :  '  What 
can  I  do  for  you  in  Paris  ?  Whom  would  you 
like  to  see  ? ' 

" '  I  should  like  to  know  Madame  George 
Sand..' 

"  '  Unfortunately  that  is  impossible !  I  have 
just  quarreled  with  Madame  Sand  !' 


44  LONGFELLOW 

"  ' Ah  !  then,  Alexandra  Dumas,  —  I  should 
like  to  take  him  by  the  hand  ! ' 

"'I  have  quarreled  with  him  also,  but  no 
matter!  Vous perdriez  vos  illusions' 

"  However,  he  invited  me  to  dine  the  next 
day,  and  I  had  a  singular  experience ;  but  I 
shall  not  soon  forget  the  way  in  which  he  said, 
'vous  perdriez  Vos  illusions.' 

"  When  I  arrived  on  the  following  day  I  found 
the  company  consisted  of  his  wife  and  himself, 
a  little  red-haired  man  who  was  rather  quiet  and 
cynical,  and  myself.  Janin  was  amusing  and 
noisy,  and  carried  the  talk  on  swimmingly  with 
much  laughter.  Presently  he  began  to  say  hard 
things  about  women,  when  his  wife  looked  up 
reproachfully  and  said,  '  Deja,  Jules  !'  During 
dinner  a  dramatic  author  arrived  with  his  play, 
and  Janin  ordered  him  to  be  shown  in.  He 
treated  the  poor  fellow  brutally,  who  in  turn 
bowed  low  to  the  great  power.  He  did  not  even 
ask  him  to  take  a  chair.  Madame  Janin  did  so, 
however,  and  kindly,  too.  The  author  suppli 
cated  the  critic  to  attend  the  first  appearance  of 
his  play.  Janin  would  not  promise  to  go,  but 
put  him  off  indefinitely,  and  presently  the  poor 
man  went  away.  He  tingled  all  over  with  in 
dignation  at  the  treatment  the  man  received, 
but  Janin  looked  over  to  his  wife,  saying, 
'  Well,  my  dear,  I  treated  this  one  pretty  well, 
did  n't  I  ? ' 

" '  Better  than  sometimes,  Jules,'  she  an 
swered." 


LONGFELLOW  45 

Altogether  it  was  a  strange  scene  to  the 
young  American  observer. 

"July,  1867. — Passed  the  day  at  Nahant. 
As  Longfellow  sat  on  the  piazza  wrapped  in  his 
blue  cloth  cloak,  he  struck  me  for  the  first  time 
as  wearing  a  venerable  aspect.  Before  dinner 
he  gathered  wild  roses  to  adorn  the  table,  and 
even  gave  a  careful  touch  himself  to  the  ar 
rangement  of  the  wines  and  fruits.  He  was 
in  excellent  spirits,  full  of  wit  and  lively  talk. 
Speaking  of  the  use  and  misuse  of  words,  he 
quoted  Chateaubriand's  mistake  (afterwards  cor 
rected)  in  his  translation  of  '  Paradise  Lost,' 
when  he  rendered 

"  •  Siloa's  brook  that  flowed 
Fast  by  the  oracle  of  God,' 

as 

" '  Le  ruisseau  de  Siloa  qui  coulait  rapidement.' " 

In  talking  about  natural  differences  in  char 
acter  and  temperament,  he  said  of  his  own  chil 
dren  that  he  agreed  with  one  of  the  old  English 
divines  who  said,  "  Happy  is  that  household 
wherein  Martha  still  reproves  Mary !  " 

In  February,  1868,  it  was  decided  that  Long 
fellow  should  go  to  Europe  with  his  family. 
He  said  that  the  first  time  he  went  abroad  it 
was  to  see  places  alone  and  not  persons  ;  the 
second  time  he  saw  a  few  persons,  and  so  pleas 
antly  combined  the  two  ;  he  thought  once  that 
on  a  third  visit  he  should  prefer  to  see  persons 
only  ;  but  all  that  was  changed  now.  He  had 


46  LONGFELLOW 

returned  to  the  feeling  of  his  youth.  He  was 
eager  to  seek  out  quiet  places  and  wayside 
nooks,  where  he  might  rest  in  retirement  and 
enjoy  the  consecrated  memorials  of  Europe  un 
disturbed. 

The  following  year  found  him  again  in  Cam 
bridge,  refreshed  by  his  absence.  The  diary 
continues  :  "  He  has  been  trying  to  further  the 
idea  of  buying  some  of  the  lowlands  in  Cam 
bridge  for  the  colleges.  If  this  can  be  done,  it 
will  save  much  future  annoyance  to  the. inhab 
itants  from  wretched  hovels  and  bad  odors, 
beside  holding  the  land  for  a  beautiful  pos 
session  forever.  He  has  given  a  good  deal  of 
money  himself.  This  might  be  called  '  his 
latest  work.' ' 

"January,  1870.  —  Longfellow  and  Bayard 
Taylor  came  to  dine.  Longfellow  talked  of 
translators  and  translating.  He  advanced  the 
idea  that  the  English,  from  the  insularity  of 
their  character,  were  incapable  of  making  a  per 
fect  translation.  Americans,  French,  and  Ger 
mans,  he  said,  have  much  larger  adaptability  to 
and  sympathy  in  the  thought  of  others.  He 
would  not  hear  Chapman's  Homer  or  anything 
else  quoted  on  the  other  side,  but  was  zealous 
in  enforcing  this  argument.  He  anticipates 
much  from  Taylor's  version  of  '  Faust.'  All  this 
was  strikingly  interesting,  as  showing  how  his 
imagination  wrought  with  him,  because  he  was 
arguing  from  his  own  theory  of  the  capacity  of 


LONGFELLOW  47 

the  races  and  in  the  face  of  his  knowledge  of 
the  best  actual  translations  existing  to-day,  the 
result  of  the  scholarship  of  England. 

"  Longfellow  speaks  of  difficulty  in  sleeping. 
In  his  college  days  and  later  he  had  the  habit 
of  studying  until  midnight  and  rising  at  six  in 
the  morning,  finding  his  way  as  soon  as  possible 
to  his  books.  Possibly  this  habit  still  prevents 
him  from  getting  sufficient  rest.  However  light 
may  be  the  literature  in  which  he  indulges  be 
fore  going  to  bed,  some  chance  thought  may 
strike  him  as  he  goes  up  the  stairs  with  the 
bedroom  candle  in  his  hand  which  will  preclude 
all  possibility  of  sleep  until  long  after  midnight. 

"  His  account  of  Saint e-Beuve  during  his  last 
visit  to  Europe  was  an  odd  little  drama.  He 
had  grown  excessively  fat,  and  could  scarcely 
move.  He  did  not  attempt  to  rise  from  his 
chair  as  Longfellow  entered,  but  motioned  him 
to  a  seat  by  his  side.  Talking  of  Victor  Hugo 
and  Lamartine,  '  Take  them  for  all  in  all,  which 
do  you  prefer  ? '  asked  Longfellow. 

"'Charlatan  pour  charlatan,  je  crois  que  je 
prefere  Monsieur  de  Lamartine,'  was  the  reply. 

"  Longfellow  amused  me  by  making  two  epi 
grams  :  — 

"  '  What  is  autobiography  ? 
It  is  what  a  biography  ought  to  be.* 

"  And  again  :  — 

" '  When  you  ask  one  friend  to  dine, 
Give  him  your  best  wine  ! 
When  you  ask  two, 
The  second  best  will  do  1 ' 


48  LONGFELLOW 

"  He  brought  in  with  him  two  poems  trans 
lated  from  Platen's  '  Night  Songs.'  They  are 
very  beautiful. 

"  '  What  dusky  splendors  of  song  there  are  in 
King  Alfred's  new  volume/  he  said.  '  It  is  al 
ways  a  delight  to  get  anything  new  from  him. 
His  "  Holy  Grail  "  and  Lowell's  "  Cathedral  " 
are  enough  for  a  holiday,  and  make  this  one 
notable.'  " 

When  Longfellow  talked  freely  as  at  this 
dinner,  it  was  difficult  to  remember  that  he  was 
not  really  a  talker.  The  natural  reserve  of  his 
nature  made  it  sometimes  impossible  for  him 
to  express  himself  in  ordinary  intercourse.  He 
never  truly  made  a  confidant  of  anybody  except 
his  Muse. 

"  I  never  thought,"  he  wrote  about  this  time, 
"that  I  should  come  back  to  this  kind  of  work." 
He  was  busying  himself  with  collecting  and 
editing  "The  Poems  of  Places."  "It  trans 
ports  me  to  my  happiest  years,  and  the  con 
trast  is  too  painful  to  think  of."  And  again  in 
calmer  mood  :  "  The  '  ruler  of  the  inverted 
year'  (whatever  that  may  mean)  has,  you  per 
ceive,  returned  again,  like  a  Bourbon  from  ban 
ishment,  and  is  having  it  all  his  own  way,  and 
it  is  not  a  pleasant  way.  Very  well,  one  can  sit 
by  the  fire  and  read,  and  hear  the  wind  roar  in 
the  chimney,  and  write  to  one's  friends,  and 
sign  one's  self  '  yours  faithfully,'  or  as  in  the 
present  instance,  '  yours  always.' ' 


LONGFELLOW  49 

His  sympathetic  nature  was  ever  ready  to 
share  and  further  the  gayety  of  others.  He 
wrote  one  evening  :  — 

"I  have  been  kept  at  home  by  a  little  dan 
cing-party  to-night.  ...  I  write  this  arrayed 
in  my  dress-coat  with  a  rose  in  my  buttonhole, 
a  circumstance,  I  think,  worth  mentioning.  It 
reminds  me  of  Buffon,  who  used  to  array  him 
self  in  his  full  dress  for  writing  '  Natural  His 
tory.'  Why  should  we  not  always  do  it  when 
we  write  letters  ?  We  should,  no  doubt,  be 
more  courtly  and  polite,  and  perhaps  say  hand 
some  things  to  each  other.  It  was  said  of  Ville- 
main  that  when  he  spoke  to  a  lady  he  seemed 
to  be  presenting  her  a  bouquet.  Allow  me  to 
present  you  this  postscript  in  the  same  polite 
manner,  to  make  good  my  theory  of  the  rose 
in  the  buttonhole." 

How  delightful  it  is  to  catch  the  intoxication 
of  the  little  festival  in  this  way.  In  his  en 
deavor  to  further  the  gayeties  of  his  children 
he  had  received  a  reflected  light  and  life  which 
his  love  for  them  had  helped  to  create. 

"December  14,  1870.  —  Taylor's  'Faust'  is 
finished,  and  Longfellow  is  coming  with  other 
friends  to  dinner  to  celebrate  the  ending  of  the 
work.  .  .  . 

"A  statuette  of  Goethe  was  on  the  table. 
Longfellow  said  Goethe  never  liked  the  statue 
of  himself  by  Rauch,  from  which  this  copy  was 
made.  He  preferred  above  all  others  a  bust  of 


50  LONGFELLOW 

himself  by  a  Swiss  sculptor,  a  copy  of  which 
Taylor  owns.  He  could  never  understand,  he 
continued,  the  story  of  that  unpleasant  inter 
view  between  Napoleon  and  Goethe.  Ecker- 
mann  says  Goethe  liked  it,  but  Longfellow 
thought  the  emperor's  manner  of  address  had  a 
touch  of  insolence  in  it.  The  haunts  of  Goethe 
in  Weimar  were  pleasantly  recalled  by  both 
Longfellow  and  Taylor,  to  whom  they  were  fa 
miliar  ;  also  that  strange  portrait  of  him  taken 
standing  at  a  window,  and  looking  out  over 
Rome,  in  which  nothing  but  his  back  can  be 
seen. 

"  I  find  it  impossible  to  recall  what  Longfel 
low  said,  but  he  scintillated  all  the  evening.  It 
was  an  occasion  such  as  he  loved  best.  His 
jeux  d?  esprit  flew  rapidly  right  and  left,  often 
setting  the  table  in  a  roar  of  laughter,  a  most 
unusual  thing  with  him." 

There  was  evidently  no  such  pleasure  to 
Longfellow  as  that  of  doing  kindnesses.  One 
of  many  notes  bearing  on  such  subjects  belongs 
to  this  year,  and  begins  :  — 

"  A  thousand  thanks  for  your  note  and  its 
inclosure.  There  goes  a  gleam  of  sunshine  into 
a  dark  house,  which  is  always  pleasant  to  think 
of.  I  have  not  yet  got  the  senator's  sunbeam 
to  add  to  it ;  but  as  soon  as  I  do,  both  shall  go 
shining  on  their  way." 

"January,  1871.  —  Dined  at  Longfellow's, 
and  afterwards  went  upstairs  to  see  an  inter- 


LONGFELLOW  51 

esting  collection  of  East  Indian  curiosities. 
Passing  through  his  dressing-room,  I  was  struck 
with  the  likeness  of  his  private  rooms  to  those 
of  a  German  student  or  professor ;  a  Goethean 
aspect  of  simplicity  and  space  everywhere,  with 
books  put  in  the  nooks  and  corners  and  all  over 
the  walls.  It  is  surely  a  most  attractive  house  !  " 

Again  I  find  a  record  of  a  dinner  at  Cam 
bridge  :  "  The  day  was  springlike,  and  the  air 
full  of  the  odors  of  fresh  blossoms.  As  we 
came  down  over  the  picturesque  old  staircase, 
he  was  standing  with  a  group  of  gentlemen 
near  by,  and  I  heard  him  say  aloud  uncon 
sciously,  in  a  way  peculiar  to  himself,  '  Ah,  now 
we  shall  see  the  ladies  come  downstairs ! ' 
Nothing  escapes  his  keen  observation  —  as  del 
icate  as  it  is  keen." 

And  in  the  same  vein  the  journal  rambles 
on :  — 

"  Friday.  —  Longfellow  came  into  luncheon 
at  one  o'clock.  He  was  looking  very  well ;  .  .  . 
his  beautiful  eyes  fairly  shone.  He  had  been  at 
Manchester-by-the-Sea  the  day  before  to  dine 
with  the  Curtises.  Their  truly  romantic  and 
lovely  place  had  left  a  pleasant  picture  in  his 
mind.  Coming  away  by  the  train,  he  passed  in 
Chelsea  a  new  soldiers'  monument  which  sug 
gested  an  epigram  to  him  that  he  said,  laugh 
ingly,  would  suit  any  of  the  thousand  of  such 
monuments  to  be  seen  about  the  country.  He 
began  somewhat  in  this  style  :  — 


52  LONGFELLOW 

"'  The  soldier  asked  for  bread, 
But  they  waited  till  he  was  dead, 
And  gave  him  a  stone  instead, 
Sixty  and  one  feet  high  ! ' 

"We  all  returned  to  Cambridge  together, 
and,  being  early  for  our  own  appointment  else 
where,  he  carried  us  into  his  library  and  read 
aloud  '  The  Marriage  of  Lady  Wentworth.' 

E ,  with  pretty  girlish  ways  and  eyes  like 

his  own,  had  let  us  into  the  old  mansion  by  the 
side  door,  and  then  lingered  to  ask  if  she  might 
be  allowed  to  stay  and  hear  the  reading  too. 
He,  consenting,  laughingly,  lighted  a  cigar  and 
soon  began.  His  voice  in  reading  was  sweet 
and  melodious,  and  it  was  touched  with  tremu- 
lousness,  although  this  was  an  easier  poem  to 
read  aloud  than  many  others,  being  strictly  nar 
rative.  It  is  full  of  New  England  life  and  is  a 
beautiful  addition  to  his  works.  He  has  a  fancy 
for  making  a  volume,  or  getting  some  one  else 
to  do  it,  of  his  favorite  ghost  stories,  'The 
Flying  Dutchman,'  'Peter  Rugg,'  and  a  few 
others." 

On  another  occasion  the  record  says  :  — 
"Passed  the  evening  at  Longfellow's.  As 
we  lifted  the  latch  and  entered  the  hall  door,  we 
saw  him  reading  an  old  book  by  his  study  lamp. 
It  was  the  '  Chansons  d'Espagne/  which  he  had 
just  purchased  at  what  he  called  the  massacre 
of  the  poets  ;  in  other  words,  at  the  sale  that 
day  of  the  library  of  William  H.  Prescott.  He 


LONGFELLOW  53 

was  rather  melancholy,  he  said:  first,  on  ac 
count  of  the  sacrifice  and  separation  of  that  fine 
library ;  also  because  he  is  doubtful  about  his 
new  poem,  the  one  on  the  life  of  our  Saviour. 
He  says  he  has  never  before  felt  so  cast  down. 

"  What  an  orderly  man  he  is  !  Well-ordered, 
I  should  have  written.  Diary,  accounts,  scraps, 
books,  —  everything  where  he  can  put  his  hand 
upon  it  in  a  moment." 

"December,  1871. —  Saturday  Mr.  Longfellow 
came  in  town  and  went  with  us  to  hear  twelve 
hundred  school  children  sing  a  welcome  to  the 
Russian  Grand  Duke  in  the  Music  Hall.  It 
was  a  fine  sight,  and  Dr.  Holmes's  hymn,  writ 
ten  for  the  occasion,  was  noble  and  inspiring. 
Just  before  the  Grand  Duke  came  in  I  saw  a 
smile  creep  over  Longfellow's  face.  'I  can 
never  get  over  the  ludicrousness  of  it/  he  said. 
'  All  this  array  and  fuss  over  one  man  ! '  He 
came  home  with  us  afterwards,  and  lingered 
awhile  by  the  fire.  He  talked  of  Russian  liter 
ature,  —  its  modernness,  and  said  he  had  sent 
us  a  delightful  novel  by  Tourgue'neff,  '  Liza,' 
in  which  we  should  find  charming  and  vivid 
glimpses  of  landscape  and  life  like  those  seen 
from  a  carriage  window.  We  left  him  alone  in 
the  library  for  a  while,  and  returning  found  him 
amusing  himself  over  the  '  Ingoldsby  Legends.' 
He  was  reading  the  'Coronation  of  Victoria,' 
and  laughing  over  Count  Froganoff,  who  could 
not  get  'prog  enough,'  and  was  'found  eating 


54  LONGFELLOW 

underneath  the  stairs/  He  wants  to  have  a 
dinner  for  Bayard  Taylor,  whose  coming  is 
always  the  signal  for  a  series  of  small  festivities. 
His  own  'Divine  Tragedy'  is  just  out,  and 
everybody  speaks  of  its  simplicity  and  beauty." 

"  April.  —  In  the  evening  Longfellow  came 
in  town  for  the  purpose  of  hearing  a  German 
gentleman  read  an  original  poem,  and  he  per 
suaded  me  to  go  with  him.  The  reader  twisted 
his  face  up  into  frightful  knots,  and  delivered 
his  poem  with  vast  apparent  satisfaction  to  him 
self  if  not  to  his  audience.  It  was  fortunate  on 
the  whole  that  the  production  was  in  a  foreign 
tongue,  because  it  gave  us  the  occupation,  at 
least,  of  trying  to  understand  the  words,  —  the 
poem  itself  possessing  not  the  remotest  interest 
for  either  of  us.  It  was  in  the  old  sentimental 
German  style  familiar  to  the  readers  of  that  lit 
erature.  Longfellow  amused  me  as  we  walked 
home  by  imitating  the  sing-song  voice  we  had 
been  following  all  the  evening.  He  also  recited 
in  the  original  that  beautiful  little  poem  by  Pla 
ten,  'In  der  Nacht,  in  der  Nacht,'  in  a  most 
delightful  manner.  '  Ah,'  he  said,  '  to  trans 
late  a  poem  properly  it  must  be  done  into  the 
metre  of  the  original,  and  Bryant's  "  Homer," 
fine  as  it  is,  has  this  great  fault,  that  it  does  not 
give  the  music  of  the  poem  itself.'  He  came  in 
and  took  a  cigar  before  walking  home  over  the 
bridge  alone.  .  .  . 

"  Emerson  asked  Longfellow  at  dinner  about 


LONGFELLOW  55 

his  last  visit  to  England,  of  Ruskin  and  other 
celebrities.  Longfellow  is  always  reticent  upon 
such  subjects,  but  he  was  eager  to  tell  us  how 
very  much  he  had  enjoyed  Mr.  Ruskin.  He 
said  it  was  one  of  the  most  surprising  things  in 
the  world  to  see  the  quiet,  gentlemanly  way  in 
which  Ruskin  gave  vent  to  his  extreme  opin 
ions.  It  seems  to  be  no  effort  to  him,  but  as  if 
it  were  a  matter  of  course  that  every  one  should 
give  expression  to  the  faith  that  is  in  him  in  the 
same  unvarnished  way  as  he  does  himself,  not 
looking  for  agreement,  but  for  conversation  and 
discussion.  *  It  is  strange/  Ruskin  said,  '  being 
considered  so  much  out  of  harmony  with  Amer 
ica  as  I  am,  that  the  two  Americans  I  have 
known  and  loved  best,  you  and  Norton,  should 
give  me  such  a  feeling  of  friendship  and  repose.' 
Longfellow  then  spoke  of  Mrs.  Matthew  Arnold, 
whom  he  liked  very  much,  —  thought  her,  as 
he  said,  *a  most  lovely  person.'  Also  of  the 
'beautiful  Lady  Herbert/  as  one  of  the  most 
delightful  of  women.  .  .  . 

"  Longfellow  came  in  to  an  early  dinner  to 
meet  Mr.  Joseph  Jefferson,  Mr.  William  War 
ren,  and  Dr.  Holmes.  He  said  he  felt  like  one 
on  a  journey.  He  had  left  home  early  in  the 
morning,  had  been  sight-seeing  in  Boston  all 
day,  was  to  dine  and  go  to  the  theatre  with  us 
afterwards.  The  talk  naturally  turned  upon  the 
stage.  Longfellow  said  he  thought  Mr.  Charles 
Mathews  was  entirely  unjust  in  his  criticisms 


56  LONGFELLOW 

upon  Mr.  Forrest's  King  Lear.  He  considered 
Mr.  Forrest's  rendering  of  the  part  as  very  fine 
and  close  to  nature.  He  could  not  understand 
why  Mr.  Mathews  should  underrate  it  as  he 
did.  Longfellow  showed  us  a  book  given  him 
by  Charles  Sumner.  In  it  was  an  old  engraving 
(from  a  painting  by  Giulio  Clovio)  of  the  moon, 
in  which  Dante  is  walking  with  his  companion. 
He  said  it  was  a  most  impressive  picture  to 
him.  He  knew  it  in  the  original ;  also  there  is 
a  very  good  copy  in  the  Cambridge  Library 
among  the  copies  of  illuminated  manuscripts." 

There  is  a  little  note  belonging  to  this  period 
full  of  poetic  feeling  and  giving  more  than  a 
hint  at  the  wearifulness  of  interrupting  visi 
tors  :  — 

"  I  send  you  the  pleasant  volume  I  promised 
you  yesterday.  It  is  a  book  for  summer  moods 
by  the  seaside,  but  will  not  be  out  of  place  on  a 
winter  night  by  the  fireside.  .  .  .  You  will  find 
an  allusion  to  the  *  blue  borage  flowers '  that 
flavor  the  claret-cup.  I  know  where  grows  an 
other  kind  of  bore-age  that  embitters  the  goblet 
of  life.  I  can  spare  you  some  of  this  herb,  if  you 
have  room  for  it  in  your  garden  or  your  garret. 
It  is  warranted  to  destroy  all  peace  of  mind,  and 
finally  to  produce  softening  of  the  brain  and  in 
sanity. 

" '  Better  juice  of  vine 
Than  berry  wine  1 
Fire !  fire  !  steel,  oh,  steel  1 
Fire  !  fire  I  steel  and  fire ! '  " 


LONGFELLOW  57 

The  following,  written  in  the  spring  of  the 
same  year,  gives  a  hint  of  what  a  festival  season 
it  was  to  him  while  the  lilacs  which  surround 
his  house  were  in  bloom  :  — 

"  Here  is  the  poem,  copied  for  you  by  your 
humble  scribe.  I  found  it  impossible  to  crowd 
it  into  a  page  of  note  paper.  Come  any  pleas 
ant  morning,  as  soon  after  breakfast  or  before 
as  you  like,  and  we  will  go  on  with  the  '  Michael 
Angelical'  manuscript.  I  shall  not  be  likely  to 
go  to  town  while  the  lilacs  are  in  bloom." 

The  rambling  diary  continues :  "To-day  Long 
fellow  sent  us  half  a  dozen  bottles  of  wine,  and 
after  them  came  a  note  saying  he  had  sent  them 
off  without  finding  time  to  label  them.  *  They 
are  wine  of  Avignon,'  he  added,  'and  should 
bear  this  inscription  from  Redi :  — 

" '  Benedetto 
Quel  claretto 
Che  si  spilla  in  Avignone. ' " 

About  this  period  Longfellow  invited  an  old 
friend,  who  had  fallen  into  extreme  helplessness 
from  ill  health,  to  come  and  make  him  a  visit. 
It  was  a  great  comfort  to  his  friend,  a  scholar 
like  himself,  "to  nurse  the  dwindling  faculty 
of  joy"  in  such  companionship,  and  he  lingered 
many  weeks  in  the  sunshine  of  the  old  house. 
Longfellow's  patience  and  devoted  care  for  this 
friend  of  his  youth  was  a  signal  example  of  what 
a  true  and  constant  heart  may  do  unconsciously, 
in  giving  expression  and  recognition  to  the  bond 


58  LONGFELLOW 

of  a  sincere  friendship.  Long  after  his  friend 
was  unable  to  rise  from  his  chair  without  as 
sistance  or  go  unaccompanied  to  his  bedroom, 
Longfellow  followed  the  lightest  unexpressed 
wish  with  his  sympathetic  vision  and  performed 
the  smallest  offices  unbidden.  "  Longfellow, 
will  you  turn  down  my  coat  collar  ? "  I  have 
heard  him  say  in  a  plaintive  way,  and  it  was  a 
beautiful  lesson  to  see  the  quick  and  cheerful 
response  which  would  follow  many  a  like  sug 
gestion. 

In  referring  to  this  trait  of  his  character,  I 
find  among  the  notes  made  by  Mr.  Fields  on 
Longfellow  :  "  One  of  the  most  occupied  of  all 
our  literary  men  and  scholars,  he  yet  finds  time 
for  the  small  courtesies  of  existence,  those  mi 
nor  attentions  that  are  so  often  neglected.  One 
day,  seeing  him  employed  in  cutting  something 
from  a  newspaper,  I  asked  him  what  he  was 
about.  ' Oh,'  said  he,  'here  is  a  little  paragraph 
speaking  kindly  of  our  poor  old  friend  Blank ; 
you  know  he  seldom  gets  a  word  of  praise,  poor 
fellow,  nowadays  ;  and  thinking  he  might  not 
chance  to  see  this  paper,  I  am  snipping  out  the 
paragraph  to  mail  to  him  this  afternoon.  I  know 
that  even  these  few  lines  of  recognition  will 
make  him  happy  for  hours,  and  I  could  not  bear 
to  think  he  might  perhaps  miss  seeing  these 
pleasant  words  so  kindly  expressed.'  " 

"May  Day,  1876.  —  Longfellow  dined  with 
us.  He  said  during  the  dinner,  when  we  heard 


LONGFELLOW  59 

a  blast  of  wintry  wind  howling  outside,  '  This  is 
May  day  enough ;  it  does  not  matter  to  us  how 
cold  it  is  outside.'  He  was  inclined  to  be  silent, 
for  there  were  other  and  brilliant  talkers  at  the 
table,  one  of  whom  said  to  him  in  a  pause  of  the 
conversation,  'Longfellow,  tell  us  about  your 
self  ;  you  never  talk  about  yourself/  '  No,'  said 
Longfellow  gently, '  I  believe  I  never  do.'  '  And 
yet,'  continued  the  first  speaker  eagerly,  'you 
confessed  to  me  once '  —  '  No,'  said  Longfel 
low,  laughing,  'I  think  I  never  did.'  " 

And  here  is  a  tiny  note  of  compliment,  grace 
ful  as  a  poet's  note  should  be  :  — 

"  I  have  just  received  your  charming  gift, 
your  note  and  the  stately  lilies  ;  but  fear  you 
may  have  gone  from  home  before  my  thanks 
can  reach  you. 

"  How  beautiful  they  are,  these  lilies  of  the 
field  ;  and  how  like  American  women  !  Not  be 
cause  'they  neither  toil  nor  spin,'  but  because 
they  are  elegant  and  '  born  in  the  purple.'  " 

There  is  a  brief  record  in  1879  °f  a  visit  t°  us 
in  Manchester-by-the-Sea.  Just  before  he  left 
he  said, "  After  I  am  gone  to-day,  I  want  you  to 
read  Schiller's  poem  of  the  '  Ring  of  Polycrates,' 
if  you  do  not  recall  it  too  distinctly.  You  will 
know  then  how  I  feel  about  my  visit."  He  re 
peated  also  some  English  hexameters  he  had 
essayed  from  the  first  book  of  the  Iliad.  He 
believes  the  work  may  be  still  more  perfectly 
done  than  has  ever  yet  been  achieved.  We 


60  LONGFELLOW 

drove  to  Gloucester  wrapped  in  a  warm  sea  fog. 
His  enjoyment  of  the  green  woods  and  the  sea 
breeze  was  delightful  to  watch.  "  Ay  me !  ay 
me !  woods  may  decay,"  but  who  can  dare  be 
lieve  such  life  shall  cease  from  the  fair  world  ! 

Seeing  the  Portland  steamer  pass  one  night, 
a  speck  on  the  horizon,  bearing  as  he  knew  his 
daughter  and  her  husband,  he  watched  it  long, 
then  said,  "  Think  of  a  part  of  yourself  being 
on  that  moving  speck." 

The  Sunday  following  that  visit  he  -wrote 
from  Portland :  — 

"  Church  bells  are  ringing ;  clatter  of  church- 
going  feet  on  the  pavement ;  boys  crying  '  Bos 
ton  Herald ; '  voices  of  passing  men  and  women : 
these  are  the  sounds  that  come  to  me  at  this 
upper  window,  looking  down  into  the  street. 

"I  contrast  it  all  with  last  Sunday's  silence 
at  Manchester-by-the-Sea,  and  remember  my  de 
lightful  visit  there.  Then  comes  the  thought 
of  the  moonlight  and  the  music  and  Shelley's 
verses,  — 

"  '  As  the  moon's  soft  splendor 
O'er  the  faint,  cold  starlight  of  heaven 
Is  thrown ;  ' 

and  so  on 

"  *  Of  some  world  far  from  ours, 
Where  moonlight  and  music  and  feeling 
Are  one.' 

"  How  beautiful  this  song  would  sound  if  set 
to  music  by  Mrs.  Bell  and  chanted  by  her  in 
the  twilight." 


LONGFELLOW  61 

Later  he  enclosed  the  song,  which  is  as  fol 
lows,  and  I  venture  to  reprint  it  because  he  said 
it  was  seldom  found  among  Shelley's  poems  i1 — 

AN    ARIETTE    FOR   MUSIC. 
To  a  lady  singing  to  her  accompaniment  on  the  guitar. 

As  the  moon's  soft  splendor 
O'er  the  faint,  cold  starlight  of  heaven 

Is  thrown, 

So  thy  voice  most  tender 
To  the  strings  without  soul  has  given 
Its  own. 

The  stars  will  awaken, 
Though  the  moon  sleep  a  full  hour  later 

To-night ; 

No  leaf  will  be  shaken, 
Whilst  the  dews  of  thy  melody  scatter 
Delight. 

Though  the  sound  overpowers, 
Sing  again,  with  thy  sweet  voice  revealing 

A  tone 

Of  some  world  far  from  ours, 
Where  music  and  moonlight  and  feeling 
Are  one. 

He  added:  — 

"  I  find  the  song  in  my  scrapbook,  and  send 
it  to  save  you  the  trouble  of  hunting  for  it." 

It  was  first  reprinted  in  "The  Waif,"  a  thin 
volume  of  selections  published  by  Longfellow 
many  years  ago.  "  The  Waif  "  and  "The  Es- 
tray"  preserved  many  a  lovely  poem  from  ob 
livion,  till  it  should  find  its  place  at  length 
among  its  fellows. 

1  It  is  of  course  included  in  all  later  editions. 


62  LONGFELLOW 

Already  in  1875  we  find  Longfellow  at  work 
upon  his  latest  collection  of  poems,  which  he 
called  "  Poems  of  Places."  It  was  a  much  more 
laborious  and  unrewarding  occupation  than  he 
had  intended,  and  he  was  sometimes  weary 
of  his  self-imposed  task.  He  wrote  at  this 
period  :  — 

No  politician  ever  sought  for  Places  with  half 
the  zeal  that  I  do.  Friend  and  Foe  alike  have 
to  give  Place  to 

Yours  truly,  H.  W.  L. 

Again  he  says  :  — 

"What  evil  demon  moved  me  to  make  this 
collection  of  '  Poems  of  Places '  ?  Could  I  have 
foreseen  the  time  it  would  take,  and  the  worry 
and  annoyance  it  would  bring  with  it,  I  never 
would  have  undertaken  it.  The  worst  of  it  is, 
I  have  to  write  pieces  now  and  then  to  fill  up 
gaps." 

More  and  more  his  old  friends  grew  dear  to 
him  as  the  years  passed  and  "the  goddess  Neu 
ralgia,"  as  he  called  his  malady,  kept  him  chiefly 
at  home.  He  wrote  in  1877  :  — 

"  When  are  you  coming  back  from  your  Cot 
tage  on  the  Cliffs  ?  The  trees  on  the  Common 
and  the  fountains  are  calling  for  you. 

"  '  Thee,  Tityrus,  even  the  pine-trees, 
The  very  fountains,  the  very 
Copses  are  calling.1 


LONGFELLOW  63 

Perhaps  also  your  creditors.  At  all  events  I 
am,  who  am  your  debtor." 

The  days  were  fast  approaching  when  the  old 
things  must  pass  away.  He  wrote  tenderly  :  — 

"  I  am  sorry  to  hear  that  you  are  not  quite 
yourself.  I  sympathize  with  you,  for  I  am 
somebody  else.  It  is  the  two  W's,  Work  and 
Weather,  that  are  playing  the  mischief  with  us. 
.  .  .  You  must  not  open  a  book ;  you  must  not 
even  look  at  an  inkstand.  These  are  both  con 
traband  articles,  upon  which  we  have  to  pay 
heavy  duties.  We  cannot  smuggle  them  in. 
Nature's  custom-house  officers  are  too  much  on 
the  alert." 

In  1880  he  again  wrote,  describing  the  wed 
ding  of  the  daughter  of  an  old  friend  :  — 

"  A  beautiful  wedding  it  was  ;  an  ideal  vil 
lage  wedding,  in  a  pretty  church,  and  the  Wind 
mill  Cottage  of  our  friend  resplendent  with 
autumnal  flowers.  In  one  of  the  rooms  there 
was  a  tea-kettle  hanging  on  a  crane  in  the  fire 
place. 

"  So  begins  a  new  household.  But  Miss 
Neilson's  death  has  saddened  me,  and  yester 
day  Mrs.  Horsford  came  with  letters  from  Nor 
way,  giving  particulars  of  Ole  Bull's  last  days, 
his  death  and  burial.  The  account  was  very 
touching.  All  Bergen' s  flags  at  half-mast ;  tele 
grams  from  the  King ;  funeral  oration  by  Bjorn- 
son.  The  dear  old  musician  was  carried  from 
his  island  to  the  mainland  in  a  steamer,  followed 


64  LONGFELLOW 

by  a  long  line  of  other  steamers.     No  Viking 
ever  had  such  a  funeral." 

And  here  the  extracts  from  letters  and  jour 
nals  must  cease.  It  was  a  golden  sunset,  in 
spite  of  the  increasing  infirmities  which  beset 
him  ;  for  he  could  never  lose  his  pleasure  in 
making  others  happy,  and  only  during  the  few 
last  days  did  he  lose  his  own  happiness  among 
his  books  and  at  his  desk.  The  influence  his 
presence  gave  out  to  others,  of  calm  good  cheer 
and  tenderness,  made  those  who  knew  him  feel 
that  he  possessed,  in  larger  measure  than  others, 
what  Jean  Paul  Richter  calls  "  a  heavenly  un- 
fathomableness  which  makes  man  godlike,  and 
love  toward  him  infinite."  Indeed,  this  "heav 
enly  unfathomableness  "  was  a  strong  charac-  ] 
teristic  of  his  nature,  and  the  gracious  silence  I 
in  which  he  often  dwelt  gave  a  rare  sense  of/ 
song  without  words.  Therefore,  perhaps  on/ 
that  day  when  we  gathered  around  the  form/ 
through  which  his  voice  was  never  again  to 
utter  itself,  and  heard  his  own  words  repeated 
upon  the  air  saying,  "  Weep  not,  my  friends  ! 
rather  rejoice  with  me.  I  shall  not  feel  the 
pain,  but  shall  be  gone,  and  you  shall  have 
another  friend  in  heaven,"  it  was  impossible  not 
to  believe  that  he  was  with  us  still,  the  central 
spirit,  comforting  and  uplifting  the  circle  of 
those  who  were  most  dear  to  him. 


GLIMPSES   OF  EMERSON 


GLIMPSES   OF   EMERSON 


THE  perfect  consistency  of  a  truly  great  life, 
where  inconsistencies  of  speech  become  at  once 
harmonized  by  the  beauty  of  the  whole  nature, 
gives  even  to  a  slight  incident  the  value  of  a 
bit  of  mosaic  which,  if  omitted,  would  leave  a 
gap  in  the  picture.  Therefore  we  never  tire 
of  "Whisperings"  and  "Talks"  and  "Walks" 
and  "  Letters "  relating  to  the  friends  of  our 
imagination,  if  not  of  our  fireside ;  and  in  so  far 
as  such  fragments  bring  men  ajid  women  of 
achievement  nearer  to  our  daily  lives,  without 
degrading  them,  they  warm  and  cheer  us  with 
something  of  their  own  beloved  and  human 
presence. 

From  this  point  of  view  the  publication  of  so 
many  of  these  side  lights  on  the  lives  of  what 
Emerson  himself  calls  "  superior  people,"  is 
easily  accounted  for,  and  the  following  glimpses 
will  only  confirm  what  he  expresses  of  such  na 
tures  when  he  says,  "  In  all  the  superior  people 
I  have  met  I  notice  directness,  truth  spoken 
more  truly,  as  if  everything  of  obstruction,  of 
malformation,  had  been  trained  away." 

In  reading  the  correspondence  between  Car- 


68  GLIMPSES   OF   EMERSON 

lyle  and  Emerson,  few  readers  could  fail  to  be 
impressed  with  the  generosity  shown  by  Emer 
son  in  giving  his  time  and  thought  without 
stint  to  the  publication  of  Carlyle's  books  in 
this  country.  Nor  was  this  the  single  instance 
of  his  devotion  to  the  advancement  of  his 
friends.  In  a  brief  memoir,  lately  printed,  of 
Jones  Very,  as  an  introduction  to  a  collection 
of  his  poems,  we  find  a  like  record  there. 

After  the  death  of  Thoreau,  Emerson  spared 
no  trouble  to  himself  that  his  friend's  papers 
might  be  properly  presented  to  the  reading 
world.  He  wrote  to  his  publisher,  Mr.  Fields  : 
"I  send  all  the  poems  of  Thoreau  which  I 
think  ought  to  go  with  the  letters.  These  are 
the  best  verses,  and  no  other  whole  piece  quite 
contents  me.  I  think  you  must  be  content  with 
a  little  book,  since  it  is  so  good.  I  do  not  like 
to  print  either  the  prison  piece  or  the  John 
Brown  with  these  clear  sky-born  letters  and 
poems."  After  all  his  labor  and  his  care,  how 
ever,  it  was  necessary  to  hold  consultation  with 
Thoreau' s  sister,  and  she  could  not  find  it  in 
her  heart  to  leave  out  some  of  the  tender  per 
sonalities  which  had  grown  more  dear  to  her 
since  her  brother's  death,  and  which  had  been 
omitted  in  the  selection.  She  said  that  she  was 
sure  Mr.  Emerson  was  not  pleased  at  the  resto 
rations  she  made  after  his  careful  work  of  elimi 
nation  was  finished,  but  he  was  .too  courteous 
and  kind  to  say  much,  or  to  insist  on  his  own 


GLIMPSES   OF   EMERSON  69 

way  ;  he  only  remarked,  "  You  have  spoiled  my 
Greek  statue."  Neither  was  he  himself  alto 
gether  contented  with  his  work,  and  shortly 
afterward  said  he  would  like  to  include  "  The 
Maiden  in  the  East,"  partly  because  it  was 

written  of  Mrs.  W n,  and  partly  because 

other  persons  liked  it  so  well. 

"  I  looked  over  the  poems  again  and  again," 
he  said,  "  and  at  last  reserved  but  ten,  finding 
some  blemish  in  all  the  others  which  prevented 
them  from  seeming  perfect  to  me.  How  grand 
is  his  poem  about  the  mountains  !  As  it  is  said 
of  Goethe  that  he  never  spoke  of  the  stars  but 
with  respect,  so  we  may  say  of  Thoreau  and  the 
mountains."  It  could  hardly  be  expected  of 
Thoreau' s  sister  to  sympathize  with  such  a  tri 
bunal,  especially  when  the  same  clear  judgment 
was  brought  to  bear  upon  the  letters.  Even 
touching  the  contract  for  publication  he  was 
equally  painstaking  —  far  more  so  than  for  his 
own  affairs.  He  wrote,  "I  inclose  the  first 
form  of  contract,  as  you  requested,  with  the  al 
terations  suggested  by  Miss  Thoreau."  After 
this  follows  a  careful  reiteration  in  his  own 
handwriting  of  such  alterations  as  were  desired. 

The  early  loss  of  Thoreau  and  his  love  for 
him  were,  I  had  believed,  the  root  and  flower 
which  brought  forth  fruit  in  his  noble  discourse 
on  "  Immortality ; "  but  Miss  Emerson  gener 
ously  informs  me  that  I  am  mistaken  in  this 
idea.  "  Most  of  its  framework,"  she  says,  "was 


70  GLIMPSES   OF   EMERSON 

written  seven  or  eight  years  earlier  and  deliv 
ered  in  September,  1855.  Some  parts  of  it  he 
may  have  used  at  Mr.  Thoreau's  funeral  and 
some  sentences  of  it  may  have  been  written 
then,  but  the  main  work  was  done  long  before, 
and  it  was  enlarged  twice  afterwards." 

Happy  were  they  who  heard  him  speak  at 
the  funeral  of  Henry  Thoreau.  At  whatever 
period  he  first  framed  his  intuitions  upon  the 
future  in  prose,  on  that  day  a  light  was  flashed 
upon  him  which  he  reflected  again  upon  the 
soul  of  his  listeners,  and  to  them  it  seemed 
that  a  new-born  glory  had  descended.  What 
ever  words  are  preserved  upon  the  printed 
page,  the  spirit  of  what  was  given  on  that  day 
cannot  be  reproduced.  He  wrote,  the  day  after 
Thoreau's  death,  to  Mr.  Fields:  "Come  to 
morrow  and  bring to  my  house.  We  will 

give  you  a  very  early  dinner.  Mr.  C banning 
is  to  write  a  hymn  or  dirge  for  the  funeral, 
which  is  to  be  from  the  church  at  three  o'clock. 
I  am  to  make  an  address,  and  probably  Mr. 
Alcott  may  say  something."  This  was  the  only 
announcement,  the  only  time  for  preparation. 
Thoreau's  body  lay  in  the  porch,  and  his  towns 
people  filled  the  church,  but  Emerson  made  the 
simple  ceremony  one  never  to  be  forgotten  by 
those  who  were  present.  Respecting  the  publi 
cation  of  this  address  I  find  the  following  entry 
in  a  diary  of  the  time  :  "  We  have  been  waiting 
for  Mr.  Emerson  to  publish  his  new  volume, 


GLIMPSES   OF  EMERSON  71 

containing  his  address  upon  Henry  Thoreau ; 
but  he  is  careful  of  words,  and  finds  many  to 
be  considered  again  and  again,  until  it  is  almost 
impossible  to  extort  a  manuscript  from  his 
hands." 

There  is  a  brief  note  among  the  few  letters 
I  have  found  concerning  the  poetry  of  some 
other  writer  whose  name  does  not  appear,  but 
in  the  publication  of  whose  work  Emerson  was 
evidently  interested.  He  writes  :  "  I  have  made 
the  fewest  changes  I  could.  So  do  not  shock 
the  amour  propre  of  the  poet,  and  yet  strike 
out  the  bad  words.  You  must,  please,  if  it 
comes  to  question,  keep  my  agency  out  of  sight, 
and  he  will  easily  persuade  himself  that  your 
compositor  has  grown  critical,  and  struck  out 
the  rough  syllables." 

Emerson  stood,  as  it  were,  the  champion  of 
American  letters,  and  whatever  found  notice  at 
all  challenged  his  serious  scrutiny.  The  soul 
and  purpose  must  be  there  ;  he  must  find  one 
line  to  win  his  sympathy,  and  then  it  was 
given  with  a  whole  heart.  He  said  one  day  at 
breakfast  that  he  had  found  a  young  man  !  A 
youth  in  the  far  West  had  written  him,  and 
inclosed  some  verses,  asking  for  his  criticism. 
Among  them  was  the  following  line,  which 
Emerson  said  proved  him  to  be  a  poet,  and  he 
should  watch  his  career  in  future  with  interest : 

11  Life  is  a  flame  whose  splendor  hides  its  base." 


72  GLIMPSES    OF   EMERSON 

We  can  imagine  the  kindly  letter  which  an 
swered  the  appeal,  and  how  the  future  of  that 
youth  was  brightened  by  it.  "  Emerson's  young 
man  "  was  a  constant  joke  among  his  friends, 
because  he  was  continually  filled  with  a  large 
hope ;  and  his  friend  of  the  one  line  was  not  by 
any  means  his  only  discovery. 

His  feeling  respecting  the  literary  work  of 
men  nearer  to  him  was  not  always  one  of  satis 
faction.  When  Hawthorne's  volume  of  "  Eng 
lish  Sketches "  was  printed,  he  said,  "It  is 
pellucid,  but  not  deep  ;  "  and  he  cut  out  the 
dedication  and  letter  to  Franklin  Pierce,  which 
offended  him.  The  two  men  were  so  unlike 
that  it  seemed  a  strange  fate  which  brought 
them  together  in  one  small  town.  An  under 
standing  of  each  other's  methods  or  points  of 
view  was  an  impossibility.  Emerson  spoke  once 
with  an  intimate  friend  of  the  distance  which 
separated  Hawthorne  and  himself.  They  were 
utterly  at  variance  upon  politics  and  every  the 
ory  of  life. 

Mr.  Fields  was  suggesting  to  Emerson  one 
day  that  he  should  give  a  series  of  lectures, 
when,  as  they  were  discussing  the  topics  to  be 
chosen,  Emerson  said  :  "  One  shall  be  on  the 
Doctrine  of  Leasts,  and  one  on  the  Doctrine  of 
Mosts ;  one  shall  be  about  Brook  Farm,  for  ever 
since  Hawthorne's  ghastly  and  untrue  account 
of  that  community,  in  his  '  Blithedale  Romance/ 
I  have  desired  to  give  what  I  think  the  true 
account  of  it." 


GLIMPSES   OF   EMERSON  73 

The  sons  of  Henry  James,  Senior,  being  at 
school  in  Concord  for  a  period,  Emerson  invited 
Mr.  James,  who  had  gone  to  visit  his  boys,  to 
stay  over  and  be  present  at  one  of  Mr.  Alcott's 
conversations,  which  were  already  "  an  institu 
tion  "  of  the  time.  Mr.  Alcott  began  to  speak 
upon  subjects  which  interested  Mr.  James  ;  and 
the  latter,  not  understanding,  naturally  enough, 
that  these  so-called  "Conversations"  were  in 
truth  monologues,  replied  to  Mr.  Alcott  in  his 
own  striking  style.  Finding  the  audience  alive 
to  what  he  wished  to  say,  he  continued,  and 
"did  the  talking  himself."  Miss  Mary  Emer 
son,  Emerson's  well-beloved  aunt,  the  extraor 
dinary  original  of  one  of  his  most  delightful 
papers,  was  present.  She  had  never  met  Mr. 
James  before,  and  became  greatly  excited  by 
some  of  the  opinions  he  advanced.  She  thought 
he  often  used  the  word  "  religion,"  when,  to  her 
mind,  he  appeared  to  mean,  sometimes  "dog 
matism  "  and  sometimes,  "  ecclesiasticism." 

She  bided  her  time,  though  a  storm  had  gath 
ered  within  her.  At  last,  when  a  momentary 
silence  fell  and  no  one  appeared  ready  to  re 
fute  certain  opinions  advanced  by  Mr.  James, 
"  Amita  "  rose,  took  a  chair,  and,  placing  it  in 
front  of  him,  exclaimed,  "  Let  me  confront  the 
monster!  "  The  discussion  was  then  renewed, 
excited  by  this  sally  of  "  Amita's"  wit,  and  the 
company  parted  with  a  larger  understanding  of 
the  subject  and  greater  appreciation  of  each 


74  GLIMPSES   OF  EMERSON 

other.  "It  was  a  glorious  occasion  for  those 
who  love  a  battle  of  words,"  said  one  who  was 
present.  Mr.  James  delighted  his  host  by  his 
remarks  upon  the  character  of  the  beloved 
"Amita." 

Mr.  Emerson  had  his  own  reservations  about 
Dickens.  He  could  not  easily  forgive  any  one 
who  made  him  laugh  immoderately.  The  first 
reading  of  "  Dr.  Marigold  "  in  Boston  was  an 
exciting  occasion,  and  Emerson  was  invited  to 
"assist."  After  the  reading  he  sat  talking-until 
a  very  late  hour,  for  he  was  taken  by  surprise 
at  the  novelty  and  artistic  perfection  of  the  per 
formance.  His  usual  calm  had  quite  broken 
down  under  it ;  he  had  laughed  as  if  he  might 
crumble  to  pieces,  his  face  wearing  an  expres 
sion  of  absolute  pain ;  indeed,  the  scene  was  so 
strange  that  it  was  mirth-provoking  to  those 
who  were  near.  But  when  we  returned  home 
he  questioned  and  pondered  much  upon  Dick 
ens  himself.  Finally  he  said  :  "  I  am  afraid  he 
has  too  much  talent  for  his  genius  ;  it  is  a  fear 
ful  locomotive  to  which  he  is  bound,  and  he  can 
never  be  freed  from  it  nor  set  at  rest.  You  see 
him  quite  wrong  evidently,  and  would  persuade 
me  that  he  is  a  genial  creature,  full  of  sweetness 
and  amenities,  and  superior  to  his  talents  ;  but 
I  fear  he  is  harnessed  to  them.  He  is  too  con 
summate  an  artist  to  have  a  thread  of  nature 
left.  He  daunts  me.  I  have  not  the  key." 
When  Mr,  Fields  came  in  he  repeated :  " 


GLIMPSES   OF   EMERSON  75 

would  persuade  me  that  Dickens  is  a  man  easy 
to  communicate  with,  sympathetic  and  accessi 
ble  to  his  friends  ;  but  her  eyes  do  not  see 
clearly  in  this  matter,  I  am  sure  !  " 

The  tenor  of  his  way  was  largely  stayed  by 
admiration  and  appreciation  of  others,  often  far 
beyond  their  worth.  He  gilded  his  friends  with 
his  own  sunshine.  He  wrote  to  his  publisher  : 
"  Give  me  leave  to  make  you  acquainted  with 
"  (still  unknown  to  fame),  "who  has  writ 
ten  a  poem  which  he  now  thinks  of  publishing. 
It  is,  in  my  judgment,  a  serious  and  original 
work  of  great  and  various  merit,  with  high  in 
tellectual  power  in  accosting  the  questions  of 
modern  thought,  full  of  noble  sentiment,  and 
especially  rich  in  fancy,  and  in  sensibility  to 
natural  beauty.  I  remember  that  while  reading 
it  I  thought  it  a  welcome  proof,  and  still  more 
a  prediction,  of  American  culture.  I  need  not 
trouble  you  with  any  cavils  I  made  on  the  manu 
script  I  read,  as  assures  me  that  he  has 

lately  revised  and  improved  the  original  draft. 
I  hope  you  will  like  the  poem  as  heartily  as  I 
did." 

I  find  a  record  of  one  very  warm  day  in  Bos 
ton  in  July  when,  in  spite  of  the  heat,  Mr.  Em 
erson  came  to  dine  with  us  :  — 

"  He  talked  much  of  Forceythe  Willson, 
whose  genius  he  thought  akin  to  Dante's,  and 

says  E H agrees  with  him  in  this,  or 

possibly  suggested  it,  she  having  been  one  of 


76  GLIMPSES   OF   EMERSON 

the  best  readers  and  lovers  of  Dante  outside  the 
reputed  scholars.  '  But  he  is  not  fertile.  A  man 
at  his  time  should  be  doing  new  things.'  '  Yes/ 

said ,  *  I  fear  he  never  will  do  much  more/ 

'  Why,  how  old  is  he  ? '  asked  Emerson  ;  and 
hearing  he  was  about  thirty-five,  he  replied, 
with  a  smile,  <  There  is  hope  till  forty-five/  He 
spoke  also  of  Tennyson  and  Carlyle  as  the  two 
men  connected  with  literature  in  England  who 
were  most  satisfactory  to  meet,  and  better  than 
their  books.  His  respect  for  literature  in  these 
degenerate  days  is  absolute.  It  is  religion  and 
life,  and  he  reiterates  this  in  every  possible 
form.  Speaking  of  Jones  Very,  he  said  he 
seemed  to  have  no  right  to  his  rhymes ;  they 
did  not  sing  to  him,  but  he  was  divinely  led  to 
them,  and  they  always  surprised  you." 

We  were  much  pleased  and  amused  at  his 
quaint  expressions  of  admiration  for  a  mutual 
friend  in  New  York  at  whose  hospitable  house 
we  had  all  received  cordial  entertainment.  He 
said:  "The  great  Hindoo,  Hatim  Tayi,  was 
nothing  by  the  side  of  such  hospitality  as  hers. 
Hatim  Tayi  would  soon  lose  his  reputation." 
His  appreciation  of  the  poems  of  H.  H.  was 
often  expressed.  He  made  her  the  keynote  of 
a  talk  one  day  upon  the  poetry  of  women.  The 
poems  entitled  "Joy,"  "Thought,"  "Ariadne," 
he  liked  especially.  Of  Mrs.  Hemans  he  found 
many  poems  which  still  survive,  and  he  believed 
must  always  live. 


GLIMPSES   OF   EMERSON  77 

Matthew  Arnold  was  one  of  the  minds  and 
men  to  whom  he  constantly  reverted  with  pleas 
ure.  Every  traveler  was  asked  for  the  last 
news  of  him ;  and  when  an  English  professor 
connected  with  the  same  university  as  Arnold, 
whom  Emerson  had  been  invited  to  meet,  was 
asked  the  inevitable  question,  and  found  to 
know  nothing,  Emerson  turned  away  from  him, 
and  lost  all  interest  in  his  conversation.  A  few 
days  afterward  some  one  was  heard  to  say, 
"  Mr.  Emerson,  how  did  you  like  Professor 
?" 

"Let  me  see,"  he  replied;  "is  not  he  the 
man  who  was  at  the  same  university  with  Mat 
thew  Arnold,  and  who  could  tell  us  nothing  of 
him?" 

"  How  about  Matthew  Arnold  ? "  he  said  to 
B on  his  return  from  England. 

"I  did  not  see  him,"  was  the  somewhat  cool 
reply. 

"  Yes !  but  he  is  one  of  the  men  one  wishes 
not  to  lose  sight  of,"  said  Emerson. 

"  Arnold  has  written  a  few  good  essays,"  re 
joined  the  other,  "but  his  talk  about  Homer  is 
all  nonsense." 

"  No,  no,  no  !  "  said  Emerson ;  "  it  is  good, 
every  word  of  it !  " 

When  the  lecture  on  Brook  Farm  really  came, 
it  was  full  of  wit  and  charm,  as  well  as  of  the 
truth  he  so  seriously  desired  to  convey.  The 
audience  was  like  a  firm,  elastic  wall,  against 


78  GLIMPSES   OF   EMERSON 

which  he  threw  the  balls  of  his  wit,,  while  they 
bounded  steadily  back  into  his  hand.  Almost 
the  first  thing  he  said  was  quoted  from  Hora 
tio  Greenough,  whom  he  esteemed  one  of  the 
greatest  men  of  our  country.  But  there  is 
nothing  more  elusive  and  difficult  to  retain  than 
Emerson's  wit.  It  pierces  and  is  gone.  Some 
of  the  broader  touches,  such  as  the  clothes-pins 
dropping  out  of  the  pockets  of  the  Brook  Farm 
gentlemen  as  they  danced  in  the  evening,  were 
apparent  to  all,  and  irresistible.  Nothing  could 
be  more  amusing  than  the  boyish  pettishness 
with  which,  in  speaking  of  the  rareness  of  best 
company,  he  said,  "We  often  found  ourselves 
left  to  the  society  of  cats  and  fools." 

I  find  the  following  note  in  a  brief  diary : 
"October  20,  1868.  Last  night  Mr.  Emerson 
gave  his  second  lecture.  It  was  full  of  touches 
of  light  which  dropped  from  him,  to  us,  his 
listeners,  and  made  us  burn  as  with  a  kind  of 
sudden  inspiration  of  truth.  He  was  beautiful 
both  to  hear  and  see.  He  spoke  of  poetry  and 
criticism.  .  .  . 

"  He  discovered  two  reporters  present  and 
spoke  to  them,  saying,  'It  is  not  allowed.' 
Whereat  they  both  replied :  '  They  were  only 
at  work  for  their  own  gratification.  Of  course 
I  could  say  nothing  more  ;  but  afterward  the 
Lord  smote  one  of  them  and  he  came  and  con 
fessed.'  When  he  returned  after  speaking  he 
brought  one  of  the  two  bouquets  which  he 


GLIMPSES   OF  EMERSON  79 

found  upon  his  desk.  '  I  bring  you  back  your 
flowers,'  he  said  gently.  There  was  no  loud 
applause  last  evening;  but  there  were  little 
shivers  of  delight  or  approbation  running  over 
the  audience  from  time  to  time,  like  breezes 
over  a  cornfield." 

Emerson  was  always  faithful  to  his  appre 
ciation  of  Channing's  poems.  When  "  Monad- 
nock  "  was  written,  he  made  a  special  visit  to 
Boston  to  talk  it  over,  and  the  fine  lines  of 
C  banning  were  always  ready  in  his  memory,  to 
come  to  the  front  when  called  for.  His  love 
and  loyalty  to  Elizabeth  Hoar  should  never  be 
forgotten,  in  however  imperfect  a  rehearsal  of 
his  valued  companionships.  One  morning  at 
breakfast  I  heard, him  describing  her  attributes 
and  personality  in  the  most  tender  and  engaging 
way  to  Mrs.  Stowe,  who  had  never  known  her, 
which  I  would  give  much  to  be  able  to  repro 
duce. 

Emerson's  truthfulness  was  often  the  cause 
of  mirth  even  to  himself.  I  remember  that  he 
thought  he  did  not  care  for  the  work  of  Bayard 
Taylor,  but  he  confessed  one  day  with  sly  rue 
fulness  that  he  had  taken  up  the  last  "  Atlan 
tic"  by  chance,  and  found  there  some  noble 
hexameters  upon  "  November  ; "  and  "  I  said  to 
myself,  '  Ah !  who  is  this  ?  this  is  as  good  as 
Clough.'  When  to  my  astonishment,  and  not 
a  little  to  my  discomfiture,  I  discovered  they 
were  Bayard  Taylor's !  But  how  about  this 


80  GLIMPSES   OF   EMERSON 

'  Faust '  ?  We  have  had  Dante  done  over  and 
over,  and  even  now  done,  I  see,  again  by  a  new 
hand,  and  Homer  forever  being  done,  and  now 
'  Faust' !  I  quarrel  somewhat  with  the  over 
much  labor  spent  upon  these  translations,  but 
first  of  all  I  quarrel  with  Goethe.  *  Faust '  is 
unpleasant  to  me.  The  very  flavor  of  the  poem 
repels  me,  and  makes  me  wish  to  turn  away." 
The  "Divina  Commedia,"  too,  he  continued, 
was  a  poem  too  terrible  to  him  to  read.  He 
had  never  been  able  to  finish  it.  It  is  probable 
that  poor  translations  of  both  "  Faust  "  and 
Dante  read  in  early  youth  were  at  the  bottom 
of  these  opinions. 

Emerson  was  a  true  appreciate  of  Walter 
Scott.  At  one  of  the  Saturday  Club  dinners 
it  was  suggested  that  Walter  Scott  be  made 
the  subject  of  conversation,  and  the  occasion 
be  considered  as  his  birthday.  Emerson  spoke 
with  brilliant  effect  two  or  three  times.  He 
was  first  called  out  by  his  friend  Judge  Hoar, 
who  said  he  was  chopping  wood  that  morning 
in  his  woodshed,  when  Emerson  came  in  and 
said  so  many  delightful  things  about  Sir  Walter 
that  if  he  would  now  repeat  to  the  table  only 
a  portion  of  the  excellent  sayings  heard  in  the 
woodshed  he  would  delight  them  all.  Emer 
son  rose,  and,  referring  pleasantly  to  the  bril 
liancy  of  the  judge's  imagination,  began  by  ex 
pressing  his  sense  of  gratitude  to  Walter  Scott, 
and  concluded  a  fine  analysis  of  his  work  by 


GLIMPSES   OF   EMERSON  81 

saying  that  the  root  and  gist  of  his  genius 
was  to  be  found,  in  his  opinion,  in  the  Border 
Minstrelsy.  His  loyalty  to  the  Saturday  Club 
was  quite  as  sincere  as  Dr.  Holmes' s,  but  the 
difficulties  in  the  way  of  his  constant  attend 
ance  were  somewhat  greater.  Emerson  kept 
a  friendly  lookout  over  absent  members,  and 
greeted  with  approval  any  one  who  arrived  at 
the  monthly  tryst  in  spite  of  hindrances.  See 
ing  Mr.  Fields  appear  one  day,  bag  in  hand,  at 
a  time  when  he  was  living  in  the  country,  Em 
erson  glanced  at  him  affectionately,  saying  half 
aloud,  "  Good  boy !  good  boy  !  "  At  this  meet 
ing  it  appeared  that  Lowell  and  Emerson  had 
chanced  to  go  together,  while  in  Paris,  to  hear 
Renan.  They  spoke  of  the  beauty  and  perfec 
tion  of  his  Hebrew  script  upon  the  blackboard; 
it  was  faultless,  they  said.  Emerson  added  that 
he  could  not  understand  Renan's  French,  so  he 
looked  at  Lowell,  who  wore  a  very  wise  expres 
sion,  instead. 

Emerson  was  no  lover  of  the  sentimental 
school.  The  sharp  arrow  of  his  wit  found 
a  legitimate  target  there.  Of  one  person  in 
especial,  whom  we  all  knew  and  valued  for 
extraordinary  gifts,  he  said  :  " is  irreclaim 
able.  The  sentimentalists  are  the  most  dan 
gerous  of  the  insane,  for  they  cannot  be  shut 
up  in  asylums." 

The  labor  bestowed  upon  his  own  work  be 
fore  committing  himself  to  print  was  limitless. 


82  GLIMPSES   OF   EMERSON 

I  have  referred  to  this  already  in  speaking  of 
the  publication  of  his  address  after  the  death 
of  Thoreau.  Sometimes  in  joke  a  household 
committee  would  be  formed  to  sit  in  judgment 
on  his  essays,  and  get  them  out  of  his  hands. 
The  "May-day"  poem  was  long  in  reaching  its 
home  in  print.  There  were  references  to  it 
from  year  to  year,  but  he  could  never  be  satis 
fied  to  yield  it  up.  In  April,  1865,  after  the 
fall  of  Richmond,  he  dined  with  us,  full  of  what 
he  said  was  "a  great  joy  to  the  world,  not"  alone 
to  our  little  America."  That  day  he  brought 
what  he  then  called  some  verses  on  Spring  to 
read  aloud  ;  but  when  the  reading  was  ended,  he 
said  they  were  far  "  too  fragmentary  to  satisfy 
him,"  and  quietly  folded  them  up  and  carried 
them  away  again. 

This  feeling  of  unreadiness  to  print  sprang 
as  much  from  the  wonderful  modesty  as  from 
the  sincerity  of  his  character.  He  wrote  shortly 
after  to  his  publisher  :  — 

"  I  have  the  more  delight  in  your  marked 
overestimate  of  my  poem  that  I  have  been 
vexed  with  a  belief  that  what  skill  I  had  in 
whistling  was  nearly  or  quite  gone,  and  that  I 
might  henceforth  content  myself  with  guttural 
consonants  or  dissonants,  and  not  attempt  war 
bling.  On  the  strength  of  your  note,  I  am  work 
ing  away  at  my  last  pages  of  rhyme.  But  this 
has  been  and  is  a  week  of  company.  Yet  I 
shall  do  the  best  I  can  with  the  quarters  of 
hours." 


f  OF  THE  A 

((UNIVERSITY  )) 

OF 

">SES   OF   EMERSON  83 

Again,  with  his  mind  upon  the  "  May-day  " 
poem,  he  wrote :  — 

"  I  have  long  seen  with  some  terror  the  ne 
cessity  closing  round  me,  in  spite  of  all  my  re 
sistance,  that  shall  hold  me  from  home.  It  now 
seems  fixed  to  the  2Oth  or  2 ist  March.  I  had 
only  consented  to  I  st  March.  But  in  the  nego 
tiations  of  my  agent  it  would  still  turn  out  that 
the  primary  engagements  made  a  year  ago,  and 
to  which  the  others  were  only  appendages  — 
the  primaries,  St.  Louis,  Cincinnati,  and  Pitts 
burgh  —  must  needs  thrust  themselves  into 
March,  and  without  remedy.  But  I  cannot 
allow  the  '  May-day '  to  come  till  I  come. 
There  were  a  few  indispensable  corrections 
made  and  sent  to  the  printer,  which  he  reserved 
to  be  corrected  on  the  plates,  but  of  which  no 
revise  was  ever  sent  to  me ;  and  as  good  pub 
lish  no  book  as  leave  these  errata  unexpunged. 
Then  there  is  one  quatrain,  to  which  his  notice 
was  not  called,  for  which  I  wish  to  substitute 
another.  So  I  entreat  you  not  to  finish  the 
book  except  for  the  fire  until  I  come.  As 
the  public  did  not  die  for  the  book  on  the  ist 
January,  I  presume  they  can  sustain  its  ab 
sence  on  the  i  st  April.  .  .  .  Though  I  do  not 
know  that  your  courage  will  really  hold  out 
to  publish  it  on  the  ist  April  if  I  were  quite 
ready." 

Again  in  the  same  spirit  he  writes  to  his  ed 
itor  and  publisher :  — 


84  GLIMPSES    OF   EMERSON 

You  ask  in  your  last  note  for  "  Leasts  and 
Hosts  "  for  the  "  Atlantic."  You  have  made 
me  so  popular  by  your  brilliant  advertising  and 
arrangements  (I  will  say,  not  knowing  how  to 
qualify  your  social  skill)  that  I  am  daily  receiv 
ing  invitations  to  read  lectures  far  and  near, 
and  some  of  these  I  accept,  and  must  therefore 
keep  the  readable  lectures  by  me  for  a  time, 
though  I  doubt  not  that  this  mite,  like  the 
mountain,  will  fall  into  the  "  Atlantic  "  at  last. 
Ever  your  debtor,  R.  W.  EMEKSON. 

At  another  time  he  wrote  :  — 

"  I  received  the  account  rendered  of  the  Blue 
and  Gold  Edition  of  the  ' Essays'  and  'Poems.' 
I  keep  the  paper  before  me  and  study  it  now 
and  then  to  see  if  you  have  lost  money  by  the 
transaction,  and  my  prevailing  impression  is 
that  you  have." 

It  was  seldom  he  showed  a  sincere  willing 
ness  or  desire  to  print.  One  day,  however  (it 
was  in  1863),  he  came  in  bringing  a  poem  he 
had  written  concerning  his  younger  brother, 
who,  he  said,  was  a  rare  man,  and  whose  mem 
ory  richly  deserved  some  tribute.  He  did  not 
know  if  he  could  finish  it,  but  he  would  like 
to  print  that.  It  was  about  the  same  period 
that  he  came  to  town  and  took  a  room  at  the 
Parker  House,  bringing  with  him  the  unfinished 
sketch  of  a  few  verses  which  he  wished  Mr. 
Fields  to  hear.  He  drew  a  small  table  into  the 


GLIMPSES    OF   EMERSON  85 

centre  of  the  room,  which  was  still  in  disorder 
(a  former  occupant  having  slept  there  the  pre 
vious  night),  and  then  read  aloud  the  lines  he 
proposed  to  give  to  the  press.  They  were  writ 
ten  on  separate  slips  of  paper,  which  were  fly 
ing  loosely  about  the  room  and  under  the  bed. 
A  question  arose  of  the  title,  when  Mr.  Fields 
suggested  "Voluntaries,"  which  was  cordially 
accepted  and  finally  adopted. 

He  was  ever  seeking  suggestions,  and  ready  to 
accept  corrections.  He  wrote  to  his  publisher  : 

"  I  thank  you  for  both  the  corrections,  and 
accept  them  both,  though  in  reading,  one  would 
always  say,  '  You  pet/  so  please  write,  though 
I  grudge  it  [Thou  pet],  and  [mass],  and  [min 
ster].  Please  also  to  write  [arctic],  in  the  sec 
ond  line  with  small  [a]  if,  as  I  think,  it  is  now 
written  large  [A].  And  I  forgot,  I  believe,  to 
strike  out  a  needless  series  of  quotation  com 
mas  with  which  the  printing  was  encumbered." 

His  painstaking  never  relaxed,  even  when  he 
was  to  read  a  familiar  lecture  to  an  uncritical 
audience.  He  had  been  invited  by  the  mem 
bers  of  the  Young  Ladies'  Saturday  Morning 
Club  to  read  one  of  his  essays  in  their  parlor. 
This  he  kindly  consented  to  do,  as  well  as  to 
pass  the  previous  night  with  his  friends  in 
Charles  Street,  and  read  to  them  an  unpub 
lished  paper,  which  he  called  "  Amita."  Some 
question  having  arisen  as  to  the  possibility  of 
his  keeping  both  the  engagements,  he  wrote  as 
follows :  — 


86  GLIMPSES   OF   EMERSON 

"  DEAR  MRS.  F.,  —  I  mean  surely  to  obey 
your  first  command,  namely,  for  the  visit  to 
you  on  Friday  evening  next,  and  I  fully  trust 
that  I  wrote  you  that  I  would.  .  .  .  And  now 
I  will  untie  the  papers  of  *  Amita,'  and  see  if  I 
dare  read  them  on  Friday,  or  must  find  some 
what  less  nervous." 

I  find  the  following  brief  record  of  the  occa 
sion  :  — 

"Mr.  Emerson  arrived  from  Concord.  He 
said  he  took  it  for  granted  we  should  be  occu 
pied  at  that  hour,  but  he  would  seize  the  mo 
ment  to  look  over  his  papers.  So  I  begged 
him  to  go  into  the  small  study  and  find  quiet 
there  as  long  as  he  chose.  .  .  .  Presently  Em 
erson  came  down  to  tea ;  the  curtains  were 
drawn,  and  a  few  guests  arrived.  We  sat  round 
the  tea  table  in  the  library,  while  he  told  us  of 
's  life  in  Berlin,  where  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Her 
mann  Grimm  and  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Bancroft  had 
opened  a  pleasant  social  circle  for  him.  He 
also  talked  much  of  the  Grimms.  His  friend 
ship  for  Hermann  Grimm  had  extended  over 
many  years,  and  an  interesting  correspondence 
has  grown  up  between  them.  More  guests  ar 
rived,  and  the  talk  became  general  until  the 
time  came  to  listen  to  '  Amita.'  " 

The  charm  of  that  reading  can  never  be  for 
gotten  by  those  who  heard  it.  The  paper  itself 
can  now  be  found  upon  the  printed  page  ;  but 
Emerson's  enjoyment  of  his  own  wit,  as  re- 


GLIMPSES   OF  EMERSON  87 

fleeted  back  from  the  faces  of  his  listeners,  can 
not  be  reproduced,  nor  a  kind  of  squirrel-like 
shyness  and  swiftness  which  pervaded  it. 

The  diary  continues  :  — 

"  C and were  first  at  breakfast,  but 

Mr.  Emerson  soon  followed.  The  latter  had 
been  some  time  at  work,  and  his  hands  were 
cold.  I  had  heard  him  stirring  before  seven 
o'clock.  He  came  down  bright  and  fresh,  how 
ever,  with  the  very  spirit  of  youth  in  his  face. 
At  table  they  fell  upon  that  unfailing  resource 
in  conversation,  anecdotes  of  animals  and  birds. 
Speaking  of  parrots,  Mr.  Emerson  said  he  had 
never  heard  a  parrot  say  any  of  these  wonderful 
things  himself,  but  the  Storer  family  of  Cam 
bridge,  who  were  very  truthful  people,  had  told 
him  astonishing  anecdotes  of  a  bird  belonging 
to  them,  which  he  could  not  disbelieve  because 
they  told  him. 

"  At  ten  o'clock  we  went  to  Miss  L 's, 

where  the  young  ladies'  club  was  convened  to 
hear  Mr.  Emerson  on  '  Manners.'  He  told  us 
we  should  do  better  to  stay  at  home,  as  we  had 
heard  this  paper  many  times.  Happily  we  did 
not  take  his  advice.  There  were  many  good 
things  added,  beside  the  pleasure  of  hearing 
the  old  ones  revived.  One  of  the  things  new 
to  me  was  the  saying  of  a  wise  woman,  who 
remarked  that  she  '  did  not  think  so  much  of 
what  people  said  as  of  what  made  them  say  it.' 
It  was  pretty  to  see  the  enthusiasm  of  the  girls, 


88  GLIMPSES   OF   EMERSON 

and  to  hear  what  Celia  Thaxter  called  their 
'virile  applause.' " 

During  the  same  season  Emerson  consented 
to  give  a  series  of  readings  in  Boston.  He  was 
not  easily  persuaded  to  the  undertaking  until  he 
felt  assured  of  the  very  hearty  cooperation  which 
the  proposed  title  of  "  Conversations "  made 
evident  to  him.  The  following  note  will  give 
some  idea  of  his  feeling  with  regard  to  the  plan. 

CONCORD,  24th  February,  1872. 

DEAR :  You  are  always  offering  me  kind 
ness  and  eminent  privileges,  and  for  this  cour 
ageous  proposition  of  "  Conversations  on  Liter 
ature  with  Friends,  at  Mechanics'  Hall,"  I  pause 
and  poise  between  pleasure  and  fear.  The 
name  and  the  undertaking  are  most  attrac 
tive  ;  but  whether  it  can  be  adequately  at 
tempted  by  me,  who  have  a  couple  of  tasks 
which  Osgood  and  Company  know  of,  now  on 
my  slow  hands,  I  hesitate  to  affirm.  Well,  the 
very  proposal  will  perhaps  arm  my  head  and 
hands  to  drive  these  tasks  to  a  completion. 
And  you  shall  give  me  a  few  days'  grace,  and  I 
will  endeavor  to  send  you  a  considerate  answer. 

Later,  in  March,  he  wrote  :  — 

"  For  the  proposed  '  Conversations,'  which  is 
a  very  good  name,  I  believe  I  must  accept  your 
proposition  frankly,  though  the  second  week  of 
April  looks  almost  too  near." 


GLIMPSES   OF   EMERSON  89 

As  the  appointed  time  approached,  a  fresh 
subject  for  nervousness  suggested  itself,  which 
the  following  note  will  explain  :  — 

CONCORD,  i2th  April,  1872. 

MY  DEAR  :  I  entreat  you  to  find  the 

correspondent  of  the  New  York  "  Tribune,"  who 
reports  Miss  Vaughan's  and  Henry  James's  lec 
tures  in  Boston,  and  adjure  her  or  him,  as  he 
or  she  values  honesty  and  honor,  not  to  report 
any  word  of  what  Mr.  Emerson  may  say  or  do 
at  his  coming  "  Conversations."  Tell  the  dan 
gerous  person  that  Mr.  E.  accepted  this  task, 
proffered  to  him  by  private  friends,  on  the 
assurance  that  the  audience  would  be  composed 
of  his  usual  circle  of  private  friends,  and  that 
he  should  be  protected  from  any  report ;  that 
a  report  is  so  distasteful  to  him  that  it  would 
seriously  embarrass  and  perhaps  cripple  or 
silence  much  that  he  proposes  to  communicate  ; 
and  if  the  individual  has  bought  tickets,  these 
shall  gladly  be  refunded,  and  with  thanks  and 
great  honor  of  your  friend, 

R.  W.  EMERSON. 

In  spite  of  all  these  terrors,  the  "  Conversa 
tions  "  were  an  entire  success,  financially  as 
well  as  otherwise. 

I  find  in  the  diary  :  — 

"  This  afternoon  Mr.  Emerson  gave  his  first 
*  Conversation  '  in  this  course,  which has 


po  GLIMPSES   OF  EMERSON 

arranged  for  him.  He  will  make  over  fourteen 
hundred  dollars  by  these  readings.  There  was 
much  new  and  excellent  matter  in  the  discourse 
to-day,  and  it  was  sown,  as  usual,  with  felici 
tous  quotations.  His  introduction  was  grace 
fully  done.  He  said  he  regarded  the  company 
around  him  as  a  society  of  friends  whom  it  was 
a  great  pleasure  to  him  to  meet.  He  spoke  of 
the  value  of  literature,  but  also  of  the  superior 
value  of  thought  if  it  can  be  evolved  in  other 
ways,  quoting  that  old  saying  of  Catherine  de 
Medicis,  who  remarked,  when  she  was  told  of 
some  one  who  could  speak  twenty  languages : 
'  That  means  he  has  twenty  words  for  one  idea. 
I  would  rather  have  twenty  ideas  to  one  word.'  " 

And  again :  — 

"  April  22.  —  To-day  is  the  second  of  Mr. 
Emerson's  '  Readings,'  or  *  Conversations,'  and 
he  is  coming  with  Longfellow  and  the  Hunts 
to  have  dinner  afterward.  .  .  .  We  had  a  gay, 
lovely  time  at  the  dinner ;  but,  first  about  the 
lecture.  Emerson  talked  of  poetry,  and  the 
unity  which  exists  between  science  and  poetry, 
the  latter  being  the  fine  insight  which  solves 
all  problems.  The  unwritten  poetry  of  to-day, 
the  virgin  soil,  was  strongly,  inspiringly  re 
vealed  to  us.  He  was  not  talking,  he  said, 
when  he  spoke  of  poetry,  of  the  smooth  verses 
of  magazines,  but  of  poetry  itself  wherever  it 
was  found.  He  read  favorite  single  lines  from 
Byron's  '  Island,'  giving  Byron  great  praise,  as 


GLIMPSES   OF  EMERSON  91 

if  in  view  of  the  injustice  which  has  been  done 
him  in  our  time.  After  Byron's  poem  he  read 
a  lyric  written  by  a  traveler  to  the  Tonga 
Islands,  which  is  in  Martin's  '  Travels  ; '  also  a 
noble  poem  called  '  The  Soul/  and  a  sonnet, 
by  Wordsworth.  We  were  all  entranced  as  the 
magic  of  his  sympathetic  voice  passed  from  one 
poetic  vision  to  another.  Indeed,  we  could  not 
bear  to  see  the  hour  fade  away." 

I  find  the  following  fragment  of  a  note  writ 
ten  during  May  of  that  year  :  — 

I  received  on  my  return  home  last  night,  with 
pleasure  which  is  quite  ceasing  to  surprise,  the 
final  installment  of  one  hundred  and  seven  dol 
lars  from  the  singular  soliloquies  called  "  Conver 
sations,"  inaugurated  by  the  best  of  directors. 

Evermore  thanks.  R.  W.  EMERSON. 

Again,  in  the  journal  I  find  :  — 

"  Another  lecture  from  Emerson  —  *  Poetry, 
Religion,  Love '  —  '  superna  respicit  amor.'  His 
whole  discourse  was  a  storehouse  of  delights 
and  inspirations.  There  was  a  fine  contribution 
from  Goethe  ;  a  passage  where  he  bravely  re 
counts  his  indebtedness  to  the  great  of  all  ages. 
Varnhagen  von  Ense,  Jacob  Bohmen,  Sweden- 
borg,  and  the  poets  brought  their  share. 

"  There  was  an  interlude  upon  domestic  life, 
'where  alone  the  true  man  could  be  revealed,' 
which  was  full  of  beauty. 


92  GLIMPSES   OF   EMERSON 

"  He  came  in  to-day  to  see .  He  flouts 

the  idea  of  'that  preacher,  Horace  Greeley,' 
being  put  up  as  candidate  for  president.  '  If 
it  had  been  Charles  Francis  Adams,  now,  we 
should  all  have  voted  for  him.  To  be  sure,  it 
would  be  his  father  and  his  grandfather  for 
whom  we  were  voting,  but  we  should  all  be 
lieve  in  him.' 

"We  think  this  present  course  of  lectures 
more  satisfactory  than  the  last.  One  thing  is 
certain,  he  flings  his  whole  spirit  into  them. 
He  reads  the  poems  he  loves  best  in  literature, 
and  infuses  into  their  rendering  the  pure  es 
sence  of  his  own  poetic  life.  We  can  never  for 
get  his  reading  of  '  The  Wind,'  a  Welsh  poem 
by  Taliesin  —  the  very  rush  of  the  elements 
was  in  it." 

Emerson  was  perfectly  natural  and  at  ease 
in  manner  and  speech  during  these  readings. 
He  would  sometimes  bend  his  brows  and  shut 
his  eyes,  endeavoring  to  recall  a  favorite  pas 
sage,  as  if  he  were  at  his  own  library  table. 
One  day,  after  searching  thus  in  vain  for  a  pas 
sage  from  Ben  Jonson,  he  said  :  "  It  is  all  the 
more  provoking  as  I  do  not  doubt  many  a  friend 
here  might  help  me  out  with  it." 

When  away  from  home  on  his  lecture  tours, 
Emerson  did  not  fail  to  have  his  share  of  disas 
ters.  He  wrote  from  Albany,  in  1865,  to  Mr. 
Fields  :  — 


GLIMPSES   OF   EMERSON  93 

An  unlucky  accident  drives  me  here  to  make 
a  draft  on  you  for  fifty  dollars,  which  I  hope 
will  not  annoy  you.  The  truth  is  that  I  lost 
my  wallet  —  I  fear  to  some  pickpocket  —  in 
Fairhaven,  Vermont,  night  before  last  (some 
$70  or  $80  in  it),  and  had  to  borrow  money  of 
a  Samaritan  lady  to  come  here.  I  pray  you  do 
not  whisper  it  to  the  swallows  for  fear  it  should 

go  to ,  and  he  should  print  it  in  "Fraser." 

I  am  going  instantly  to  the  best  book-shop  to 
find  some  correspondent  of  yours  to  make  me 
good.  I  was  to  have  read  a  lecture  here  last 
night,  but  the  train  walked  all  the  way  through 
the  ice,  sixty  miles,  from  six  in  the  morning, 
and  arrived  here  at  ten  at  night.  I  hope  still 
that  Albany  will  entreat  me  on  its  knees  to 
read  to-night.  One  other  piece  of  bad  news  if 
you  have  not  already  learned  it.  Can  you  not 
burn  down  the  Boston  Athenaeum  to-night  ?  for 
I  learned  by  chance  that  they  have  a  duplicate 
of  the  "Liber  Amoris."  I  hope  for  great  pros 
perity  on  my  journey  as  the  necessary  recoil  of 
such  adversities,  and  specially  to  pay  my  debts 
in  twenty  days.  Yours,  with  constant  regard, 

R.  W.  EMERSON. 

The  apprehensions  which  assailed  him  before 
his  public  addresses  or  readings  were  not  of  a 
kind  to  affect  either  speech  or  behavior.  He 
seemed  to  be  simply  detained  by  his  own  dis 
satisfaction  with  his  work,  and  was  forever 


94  GLIMPSES   OF   EMERSON 

looking  for  something  better  to  come,  even 
when  it  was  too  late.  His  manuscripts  were 
often  disordered,  and  at  the  last  moment,  after 
he  began  to  read,  appeared  to  take  the  form  in 
his  mind  of  a  forgotten  labyrinth  through  which 
he  must  wait  to  find  his  way  in  some  more  op 
portune  season. 

In  the  summer  of  1867  he  delivered  the  ad 
dress  before  the  Phi  Beta  at  Harvard.  He 
seemed  to  have  an  especial  feeling  of  unreadi 
ness  on  that  day,  and,  to  increase  the  trouble, 
his  papers  slipped  away  in  confusion  from  under 
his  hand  as  he  tried  to  rest  them  on  a  poorly 
arranged  desk  or  table.  Mr.  Hale  put  a  cushion 
beneath  them  finally,  after  Emerson  began  to 
read,  which  prevented  them  from  falling  again, 
but  the  whole  matter  was  evidently  out  of  joint 
in  the  reader's  eyes.  He  could  not  be  con 
tent  with  it,  and  closed  without  warming  to  the 
occasion.  It  was  otherwise,  however,  to  those 
who  listened  ;  they  did  not  miss  the  old  power  : 
but  after  the  reading  he  openly  expressed  his 
own  discontent,  and  walked  away  dissatisfied. 
Miss  Emerson  writes  to  me  of  this  occasion  : 
"You  recall  the  sad  Phi  Beta  day  of  1867. 
The  trouble  that  day  was  that  for  the  first  time 
his  eyes  refused  to  serve  him  ;  he  could  not 
see,  and  therefore  could  hardly  get  along.  His 
work  had  been  on  the  whole  satisfactory  to 
him,  and  if  he  could  have  read  it  straight  all 
would  have  been  happy  instead  of  miserable." 


GLIMPSES   OF  EMERSON  95 

On  another  and  more  private  occasion,  also, 
he  came  away  much  disappointed  himself,  be 
cause,  the  light  being  poor  and  his  manuscript 
disarranged,  he  had  not  been  just,  he  thought, 
even  to  such  matter  as  lay  before  him.  And 
who  can  forget  the  occasion  of  the  delivery  of 
the  Boston  Hymn  ?  —  that  glad  New  Year  when 
the  people  were  assembled  in  our  large  Music 
Hall  to  hear  read  the  proclamation  of  Abraham 
Lincoln.  When  it  was  known  that  Emerson 
was  to  follow  with  a  poem,  a  stillness  fell  on 
the  vast  assembly  as  if  one  ear  were  waiting  to 
catch  his  voice  ;  but  the  awful  moment,  which 
was  never  too  great  for  his  will  and  endeavor, 
was  confusing  to  his  fingers,  and  the  precious 
leaves  of  his  manuscript  fell  as  he  rose,  and 
scattered  themselves  among  the  audience. 
They  were  quickly  gathered  and  restored,  but 
for  one  instant  it  seemed  as  if  the  cup  so 
greatly  desired  was  to  be  dashed  from  the  lips 
of  the  listeners. 

His  perfect  grace  in  conversation  can  hardly 
be  reproduced,  even  if  one  could  gather  the 
arrows  of  his  wit.  But  I  find  one  or  two  slight 
hints  of  the  latter  which  are  too  characteristic  to 
be  omitted.  Speaking  of  some  friends  who  were 
contemplating  a  visit  to  Europe  just  after  our 
civil  war,  when  exchange  was  still  very  high, 
he  said  that  "  the  wily  American  would  elude 
Europe  for  a  year  yet,  hoping  exchange  would 
go  down."  On  being  introduced  to  an  invited 


96  GLIMPSES   OF   EMERSON 

guest  of  the  Saturday  Club,  Emerson  said :  "  I 
am  glad  to  meet  you,  sir.  I  often  see  your 
name  in  the  papers  and  elsewhere,  and  am 
happy  to  take  you  by  the  hand  for  the  first 
time." 

"Not  for  the  first  time,"  was  the  reply. 
"Thirty-three  years  ago  I  was  enjoying  my 
school  vacation  in  the  woods,  as  boys  will.  One 
afternoon  I  was  walking  alone,  when  you  saw 
me  and  joined  me,  and  talked  of  the  voices  of 
nature  in  a  way  which  stirred  my  boyish  pulses, 
and  left  me  thinking  of  your  words  far  into  the 
night." 

Emerson  looked  pleased,  but  rejoined  that  it 
must  have  been  long  ago  indeed  when  he  ven 
tured  to  talk  of  such  fine  subjects. 

In  conversing  with  Richard  H.  Dana  ("Two 
Years  Before  the  Mast  ")  the  latter  spoke  of  the 
cold  eyes  of  one  of  our  public  men.  "Yes," 
said  Emerson  meditatively,  "  holes  in  his  head  ! 
holes  in  his  head  !  " 

In  speaking  once  of  education  and  of  the 
slight  attention  given  to  the  development  of 
personal  influence,  he  said  "  he  had  not  yet 
heard  of  Rarey "  (the  famous  horse-tamer  of 
that  time)  "  having  been  made  Doctor  of  Laws." 

After  an  agreeable  conversation  with  a  gen 
tleman  who  had  suffered  from  ill  health,  Emer 
son  remarked,  "  You  formerly  bragged  of  bad 
health,  sir  ;  I  trust  you  are  all  right  now." 

Emerson's  reticence  with  regard  to  Carlyle's- 


GLIMPSES   OF   EMERSON  97 

strong  expressions  against  America  was  equally 
wise  and  admirable.  His  friends  crowded  about 
him,  urging  him  to  denounce  Carlyle,  as  a  sacred 
duty,  but  he  stood  serene  and  silent  as  the  rocks 
until  the  angry  sea  was  calm. 

Of  his  grace  of  manner,  what  could  be  more 
expressive  than  the  following  notes  of  compli 
ment  and  acknowledgment  ? 

"  When  I  came  home  from  my  pleasant  visit 
to  your  house  last  week  (or  was  it  a  day  or  two 
before  last  week  ?),  Mrs.  Hawthorne,  arriving 
in  Concord  a  little  later  than  I,  brought  me 
the  photograph  of  Raffaelle's  original  sketch 
of  Dante,  and  from  you.  It  appears  to  be  a 
fixed  idea  in  your  mind  to  benefit  and  delight 
me,  and  still  in  ingenious  and  surprising  ways. 
Well,  I  am  glad  that  my  lot  is  cast  in  the  time 
and  proximity  of  excellent  persons,  even  if  I 
do  not  often  see  their  faces.  I  send  my  thanks 
for  this  interesting  picture,  which  so  strangely 
brings  us  close  to  the  painter  again,  and  almost 
hints  that  a  supermarine  and  superaerial  tele 
graph  may  bring  us  thoughts  from  him  yet." 

And,  again,  with  reference  to  a  small  pho 
tograph  from  a  very  interesting  rilievo  done 
by  a  young  Roman  who  died  early,  leaving  no 
thing  in  more  permanent  form  to  attest  his 
genius : — 

"'The  Star-led  Wizards'  arrived  safely  at 
my  door  last  night,  as  the  beauty  and  splendid 
fancy  of  their  figures,  and  not  less  the  generous 


98  GLIMPSES   OF   EMERSON 

instructions  of  their  last  entertainer  and  guide, 
might  well  warrant  and  secure. 

"  It  was  surely  a  very  unlooked-for  but  to  me 
most  friendly  inspiration  of  yours  which  gave 
their  feet  this  direction.  But  they  are  and  shall 
be  gratefully  and  reverently  received  and  en 
shrined,  and  in  the  good  hope  that  you  will  so 
feel  engaged  at  some  time  or  times  to  stop  and 
make  personal  inquiry  after  the  welfare  of  your 
guests  and  wards." 

And  again  :  — 

How  do  you  suppose  that  unskillful  scholars 
are  to  live,  if  Fields  should  one  day  die  ?  Serus 
in  ccelum  redeat ! 

Affectionately  yours  and  his, 

R.  W.  EMERSON. 

Surely  the  grace  and  friendly  charm  of  these 
conversational  notes  warrant  their  preservation 
even  to  those  who  are  not  held  by  the  personal 
attraction  which  lay  behind  them. 

Again  he  writes  :  — 

"  I  have  been  absent  from  home  since  the 
noble  Saturday  evening,  or  should  have  sent 
you  this  book  of  Mr.  Stirling's,  which  you  ex 
pressed  a  wish  to  see.  The  papers  on  Macau- 
lay,  Tennyson,  and  Coleridge  interest  me,  and 
the  critic  is  master  of  his  weapons. 

"  Meantime,  in  these  days,  my  thoughts  are 
all  benedictions  on  the  dwellers  in  the  happy 
home  of  number  148  Charles  Street." 


GLIMPSES   OF   EMERSON  99 

His  appreciation  of  the  hospitality  of  others 
was  only  a  reflection  from  his  own.  I  find  a 
few  words  in  the  journal  as  follows  :  "Mr.  Em 
erson  was  like  a  benediction  in  the  house,  as 
usual.  He  was  up  early  in  the  morning  looking 
over  books  and  pictures  in  the  library."  . 

I  find  also  the  mention  of  one  evening  when 
he  brought  his  own  journal  to  town  and  read 
us  passages  describing  a  visit  in  Edinburgh, 
where  he  was  the  guest  of  Mrs.  Crowe.  She 
was  one  of  those  ladies  of  Edinburgh,  he  said, 
"  who  could  turn  to  me,  as  she  did,  and  say, 
*  Whom  would  you  like  to  meet  ? '  Of  course  I 
said,  Lord  Jeffrey,  De  Quincey,  Samuel  Brown, 
called  the  alchemist  by  chemists,  and  a  few 
others.  She  was  able,  with  her  large  hospital 
ity,  to  give  me  what  I  most  desired.  She  drove 
with  Samuel  Brown  and  myself  to  call  on  De 
Quincey,  who  was  then  living  most  uncom 
fortably  in  lodgings  with  a  landlady  who  per 
secuted  him  continually.  While  I  was  stay 
ing  at  Mrs.  Crowe's,  De  Quincey  arrived  there 
one  evening,  after  being  exposed  to  various 
vicissitudes  of  weather,  and  latterly  to  a  heavy 
rain.  Unhappily  Mrs.  Crowe's  apparently  un 
limited  hospitality  was  limited  at  pantaloons, 
and  poor  De  Quincey  was  obliged  to  dry  his 
water-soaked  garments  at  the  fireside." 

Emerson  read  much  also  that  was  interesting 
of  Tennyson  and  of  Carlyle.  Of  the  latter  he 
said  that  the  last  time  he  was  in  England  he 


loo  GLIMPSES   OF   EMERSON 

drove  directly  to  his  house.  "Jane  Carlyle 
opened  the  door  for  me,  and  the  man  himself 
stood  behind  and  bore  the  candle.  '  Well,  here 
we  are,  shoveled  together  again,'  was  his  greet 
ing.  Carlyle' s  talk  is  like  a  river,  full  and  never 
ceasing;  we  talked  until  after  midnight,  and 
again  the  next  morning  at  breakfast  we  went 
on.  Then  we  started  to  walk  to  London  ;  and 
London  bridge,  the  Tower,  and  Westminster 
were  all  melted  down  into  the  river  of  his 
speech." 

After  the  reading  that  evening  there  was 
singing,  and  Emerson  listened  attentively. 
Presently  he  said,  when  the  first  song  ended, 
"  I  should  like  to  know  what  the  words  mean." 
The  music  evidently  signified  little  to  his  ears. 
Before  midnight,  when  we  were  alone,  he  again 
reverted  to  Tennyson.  He  loves  to  gather  and 
rehearse  what  is  known  of  that  wonderful  man. 

Early  in  the  morning  he  was  once  more  in 
the  library.  I  found  him  there  laughing  over  a 
little  book  he  had  discovered.  It  was  Leigh 
Hunt's  copy  of  "  English  Traits,"  and  was  full 
of  marginal  notes,  which  amused  Emerson 
greatly. 

Not  Mrs.  Crowe's  hospitality  nor  any  other 
could  ever  compare  in  his  eyes  with  that  of  the 
New  York  friend  to  whom  I  have  already  al 
luded.  We  all  agreed  that  her  genius  was  pre 
eminent.  Here  are  two  brief  notes  of  graceful 
acknowledgment  to  his  Boston  friends  which, 


GLIMPSES   OF   EMERSON  101 

however,  may  hardly  be  omitted.  In  one  of 
these  he  says  :  — 

"  My  wife  is  very  sensible  of  your  brave  hos 
pitality,  offered  in  your  note  a  fortnight  since, 
and  resists  all  my  attempts  to  defend  your 
hearth  from  such  a  crowd.  Of  course  I  am  too 
glad  to  be  persuaded  to  come  to  you,  and  so  it 
is  our  desire  to  spend  the  Sunday  of  my  last 
lecture  at  your  house." 

In  the  other  he  says  :  — 

"  I  ought  to  have  acknowledged  and  thanked 
you  for  the  plus -Arabian  hospitality  which 
warms  your  note.  It  might  tempt  any  one  but 
a  galley-slave,  or  a  scholar  who  is  tied  to  his 
book-crib  as  the  other  to  his  oar,  to  quit  in 
stantly  all  his  dull  surroundings,  and  fly  to  this 
lighted,  genial  asylum  with  doors  wide  open  and 
nailed  back." 

There  is  a  brief  glimpse  of  Emerson  upon  his 
return  from  California  which  it  is  a  pleasure  to 
recall.  He  came  at  once,  even  before  going  to 
Concord,  to  see  Mr.  Fields.  "We  must  not 
visit  San  Francisco  too  young,"  he  said,  "or  we 
shall  never  wish  to  come  away.  It  is  called  the 
'  Golden  Gate,'  not  because  of  its  gold,  but  be 
cause  of  the  lovely  golden  flowers  which  at  this 
season  cover  the  whole  face  of  the  country 
down  to  the  edge  of  the  great  sea."  He  smiled 
at  the  namby-pamby  travelers  who  turned  back 
because  of  the  discomforts  of  the  trip  into  the 
valley  of  the  Yosemite,  It  was  a  place  full  of 


102  GLIMPSES   OF   EMERSON 

marvel  and  glory  to  him.  The  only  regret  at 
tending  the  trip  seems  to  have  been  that  he  was 
obliged  to  miss  the  meetings  of  the  Saturday 
Club,  which  were  always  dear  to  him. 

The  following  extract  gives  a  picture  of  him 
about  this  time  :  — 

"A  call  from  Mr.  Emerson,  who  talked  of 
Lowell's  'joyous  genius.'  «•  He  said:  'I  have 
read  what  he  has  done  of  late  with  great  inter 
est,  and  am  sorry  to  have  been  so  slow  as  not  to 
have  written  him  yet,  especially  as  I  am  to  meet 
him  at  the  club  dinner  to-day.  How  is  Pope  ? ' 
he  continued,  crossing  the  room  to  look  at  an 
authentic  portrait  by  Richardson  of  that  great 
master  of  verse.  '  Such  a  face  as  this  should 
send  us  all  to  re-reading  his  works  again.'  Then 
turning  to  the  bust  of  Tennyson,  by  Woolner, 
which  stood  near,  he  said,  '  The  more  I  think  of 
this  bust  and  the  grand  self-assertion  in  it,  the 
more  I  like  it.'  .  .  .  Emerson  came  in  after 

the  club  dinner ;  Longfellow  also.  Mrs.  G 

was  present,  and  bragged  grandly,  and  was  very 
smart  in  talk.  Afterward  Emerson  said  he  was 
reminded  of  Carlyle's  expression  with  regard 
to  Lady  Duff  Gordon,  whom  he  considered  a 
female  St.  Peter  walking  fearlessly  over  the 
waves  of  the  sea  of  humbug." 

Opportunities  for  social  communication  were 
sacred  in  his  eyes,  and  never  to  be  lightly 
thrown  aside.  He  wore  an  expectant  look  upon 
his  face  in  company,  as  if  waiting  for  some  new 


GLIMPSES    OF   EMERSON  103 

word  from  the  last  comer.  He  was  himself  the 
stimulus,  even  when  disguised  as  a  listener,  and 
his  additions  to  the  evenings  called  Mr.  Al- 
cott's  Conversations  were  marked  and  eagerly 
expected.  Upon  the  occasion  of  Longfellow's 
last  departure  for  Europe  in  1 869,  a  private  fare 
well  dinner  took  place,  where  Emerson,  Agas- 
siz,  Holmes,  Lowell,  Greene,  Norton,  Whipple, 
and  Dana  all  assembled  in  token  of  their  re 
gard.  Emerson  tried  to  persuade  Longfellow 
to  go  to  Greece  to  look  after  the  Klephs,  the 
supposed  authors  of  Romaic  poetry,  so  beauti 
ful  in  both  their  poetic  eyes.  Finding  this  idea 
unsuccessful,  he  next  turned  to  the  Nile,  to 
those  vast  statues  which  still  stand  awful  and 
speechless  witnesses  of  the  past.  He  was  in 
teresting  and  eloquent,  but  Longfellow  was  not 
to  be  persuaded.  It  was  an  excellent  picture 
of  the  two  contrasting  characters,  —  Longfel 
low,  serene,  considerate,  with  his  plans  arranged 
and  his  thought  resting  in  his  home  and  his 
children's  requirements  ;  Emerson,  with  eager, 
unresting  thought,  excited  by  the  very  idea  of 
travel  to  plunge  farther  into  the  strange  world 
where  the  thought  of  mankind  was  born. 

This  lover  of  hospitalities  was  also  king  in  his 
own  domain.  In  the  winter  of  1872  Mr.  Fields 
was  invited  to  read  a  lecture  in  Concord,  and 
an  early  invitation  came  bidding  us  to  pass  the 
time  under  his  roof-tree.  A  few  days  before,  a 
note  was  received,  saying  that  Emerson  him- 


104  GLIMPSES   OF   EMERSON 

self  was  detained  in  Washington,  and  could 
not  reach  home  for  the  occasion.  His  absence, 
however,  was  to  make  no  difference  about  our 
visit.  He  should  return  at  the  earliest  possible 
moment.  The  weather  turned  bitterly  cold  be 
fore  we  left  Boston.  It  was  certainly  no  less 
bleak  when  we  reached  Concord.  Even  the 
horse  that  carried  us  from  the  station  to  the 
house  had  on  his  winter  coat.  Roaring  fires 
were  blazing  when»we  reached  the  house,  which 
were  only  less  warm  than  our  welcome. 

After  supper,  just  as  the  lecture  hour  was  ap 
proaching,  I  suddenly  heard  the  front  door  open. 
In  another  moment  there  was  the  dear  sage 
himself  ready  with  his  welcome.  He  had  lec 
tured  the  previous  evening  in  Washington,  and 
left  in  the  earliest  possible  train,  coming  through 
without  pause  to  Concord.  In  spite  of  the  snow 
and  cold,  he  said  he  should  walk  to  the  lecture- 
room  as  soon  as  he  had  taken  a  cup  of  tea,  and 
before  the  speaker  had  finished  his  opening  sen 
tence  Mr.  Emerson's  welcome  face  appeared  at 
the  door. 

After  the  lecture  the  old  house  presented  a 
cheerful  countenance.  Again  the  fire  blazed, 
friends  sent  flowers,  and  Mr.  Alcott  joined  in 
conversation.  "  Quite  swayed  out  of  his  habit," 
said  Emerson,  "  by  the  good  cheer."  The  spirit 
of  hospitality  led  the  master  of  the  house  to  be 
swayed  also,  for  it  was  midnight  before  the  talk 
was  ended.  It  was  wonderful  to  see  how  strong 


GLIMPSES   OF   EMERSON  105 

and  cheerful  and  unwearied  he  appeared  after 
his  long  journey.  "  I  would  not  discourage  this 
young  acolyte,"  he  said,  turning  to  the  lecturer 
of  the  evening  and  laughing,  "  by  showing  any 
sense  of  discomfort." 

When  we  arose  the  next  morning  the  sun 
was  just  dawning  over  the  level  fields  of  snow. 
The  air  was  fresh,  the  sky  cloudless,  the  glory 
of  the  scene  indescribable.  The  weight  of 
weariness  I  had  brought  from  the  city  was 
lifted  by  the  scene  before  me,  and  by  the  in 
fluence  of  the  great  nature  who  was  befriending 
us  within  the  four  walls.  It  was  good  to  look 
upon  the  same  landscape  which  was  the  source 
of  his  own  inspirations. 

Emerson  was  already  in  the  breakfast-room  at 
eight  o'clock.  There  was  much  talk  about  the 
lack  of  education  in  English  literature  among 
our  young  people.  Emerson  said  a  Boston  man 
who  usually  appeared  sufficiently  well  informed 
asked  him  if  he  had  ever  known  Spinoza.  He 
talked  also  of  Walt  Whitman  and  Coventry 
Patmore,  and  asked  the  last  news  of  Ailing- 
ham  :  when  suddenly,  as  it  seemed,  the  little 
horse  came  again,  in  his  winter  coat,  and  carried 
us  to  the  station,  and  that  day  was  done. 

There  is  a  bit  of  description  of  Emerson  as 
he  appeared  at  a  political  meeting  in  his  earlier 
years  which  I  love  to  remember.  The  meeting 
was  called  in  opposition  to  Daniel  Webster,  and 
Emerson  was  to  address  the  people.  It  was  in 


106  GLIMPSES   OF   EMERSON 

Cambridgeport.  When  he  rose  to  speak  he  was 
greeted  by  hisses,  long  and  full  of  hate  ;  but  a 
friend  said,  who  saw  him  there,  that  he  could 
think  of  nothing  but  dogs  baying  at  the  moon. 
He  was  serene  as  moonlight  itself. 

The  days  came,  alas  !  when  desire  must  fail, 
and  the  end  draw  near.  One  morning  he  wrote 
from  Concord  :  "  I  am  grown  so  old  that, 
though  I  can  read  from  a  paper,  I  am  no  longer 
fit  for  conversation,  and  dare  not  make  visits. 
So  we  send  you  our  thanks,  and  you  shall  •  not 
expect  us." 

It  has  been  a  pleasure  to  rehearse  in  my 
memory  these  glimpses  of  Emerson,  and,  cov 
ered  with  imperfections  as  they  are,  I  have 
found  courage  for  welding  them  together  in 
the  thought  that  many  minds  must  know  him 
through  his  work  who  long  to  ask  what  he  was 
like  in  his  habit  as  he  lived,  and  whose  joy  in 
their  teacher  can  only  be  enhanced  by  such  pic 
tures  as  they  can  obtain  of  the  righteousness 
and  beauty  of  his  personal  behavion 


OLIVER   WENDELL   HOLMES 

PERSONAL  RECOLLECTIONS   AND 
UNPUBLISHED   LETTERS 


OLIVER  WENDELL  HOLMES 

PERSONAL    RECOLLECTIONS    AND    UNPUB 
LISHED   LETTERS 

DR.  HOLMES' s  social  nature,  as  expressed  in 
conversation  and  in  his  books,  drew  him  into 
communication  with  a  very  large  number  of 
persons.  It  cannot  be  said,  however,  in  this  age 
marked  by  altruisms,  that  he  was  altruistic ; 
on  the  contrary,  he  loved  himself,  and  made 
himself  his  prime  study  —  but  as  a  member  of 
the  human  race.  He  had  his  own  purposes  to 
fulfill,  his  own  self-appointed  tasks,  and  he  pre 
ferred  to  take  men  only  on  his  own  terms.  He 
was  filled  with  righteous  indignation,  in  reading 
Carlyle,  to  find  a  passage  where,  hearing  the 
door-bell  ring  one  morning  when  he  was  very 
busy,  he  exclaimed  that  he  was  afraid  it  was 
"  the  man  Emerson  !  "  Yet  Dr.  Holmes  was 
himself  one  of  the  most  carefully  guarded  men, 
through  his  years  of  actual  production,  who 
ever  lived  and  wrote.  His  wife  absorbed  her 
life  in  his,  and  mounted  guard  to  make  sure 
that  interruption  was  impossible.  Nevertheless, 
he  was  eminently  a  lover  of  men,  or  he  could 
not  have  drawn  them  perpetually  to  his  side. 


no          OLIVER   WENDELL   HOLMES 

His  writings  were  never  aimed  too  high  ;  his 
sole  wish  was  to  hit  the  heart,  if  possible ;  but 
if  a  shot  hit  the  head  also,  he  showed  a  childlike 
pride  in  the  achievement. 

When  the  moment  came  to  meet  men  face  to 
face,  what  unrivaled  gayety  and  good  cheer  pos 
sessed  him  !  He  was  king  of  the  dinner-table 
during  a  large  part  of  the  century.  He  loved 
to  talk,  but  he  was  excited  and  quickened  by 
the  conversation  of  others,  for  reverence  was 
never  absent  from  his  nature.  How  incompara 
ble  his  gift  of  conversation  was,  it  will  be  diffi 
cult,  probably  impossible,  for  any  one  to  un 
derstand  who  had  never  known  him.  It  was 
not  that  he  was  wiser,  or  wittier,  or  more  pro 
found,  or  more  radiant  with  humor,  than  some 
other  distinguished  men  ;  the  shades  of  Macau- 
lay,  Sydney  Smith,  De  Quincey,  and  Coleridge 
rise  up  before  us  from  the  past,  and  among 
his  contemporaries  we  recall  the  sallies  of  Tom 
Appleton,  the  charm  of  Agassiz,  of  Corne 
lius  Felton,  and  others  of  the  Saturday  Club  ; 
but  with  Dr.  Holmes  sunshine  and  gayety 
came  into  the  room.  It  was  not  a  determina 
tion  to  be  cheerful  or  witty  or  profound ;  but 
it  was  a  natural  expression,  like  that  of  a  child, 
sometimes  overclouded  and  sometimes  purely 
gay,  but  always  open  to  the  influences  around 
him,  and  ready  for  "a  good  time."  His  power 
of  self-excitement  seemed  inexhaustible.  Given 
a  dinner-table,  with  light  and  color,  and  some- 


OLIVER  WENDELL  HOLMES  in 

body  occasionally  to  throw  the  ball,  his  spirits 
would  rise  and  coruscate  astonishingly.  He 
was  not  unaware  if  men  whom  he  considered 
his  superiors  were  present ;  he  was  sure  to 
make  them  understand  that  he  meant  to  sit  at 
their  feet  and  listen  to  them,  even  if  his  own 
excitement  ran  away  with  him.  "  I  Ve  talked 
too  much,"  he  often  said,  with  a  feeling  of  sin 
cere  penitence,  as  he  rose  from  the  table.  "  I 
wanted  to  hear  what  our  guest  had  to  say." 
But  the  wise  guest,  seizing  the  opportunity, 
usually  led  Dr.  Holmes  on  until  he  forgot  that 
he  was  not  listening  and  replying.  It  was  this 
sensitiveness,  perhaps,  which  made  his  greatest 
charm  —  a  power  of  sympathy  which  led  him 
to  understand  what  his  companion  would  say  if 
he  should  speak,  and  made  it  possible  for  him 
to  talk  in  a  measure  for  others  as  well  as  to 
express  himself. 

Nothing,  surely,  could  be  more  unusual  and 
beautiful  than  such  a  gift,  nor  any  more  purely 
his  own.  His  conversation  reminded  one  of 
those  beautiful  danseuses  of  the  South  upon 
whom  every  eye  is 'fastened,  by  whom  every 
sense  is  fascinated,  but  who  dance  up  to  their 
companions,  and  lead  them  out,  and  make  them 
feel  all  the  exhilaration  of  the  occasion,  while 
the  leader  alone  possesses  all  the  enchantment 
and  all  the  inspiration.  Of  course  conversation 
of  this  kind  is  an  outgrowth  of  character.  His 
reverence  was  one  source  of  its  inspiration,  and 


H2          OLIVER  WENDELL   HOLMES 

a  desire  to  do  everything  well  which  he  under 
took.  He  was  a  faithful  friend  and  a  keen  ap- 
preciator;  he  disliked  profoundly  to  hear  the 
depreciation  of  others.  His  character  was  clear- 
cut  and  defined,  like  his  small,  erect  figure  ; 
perfect  of  its  kind,  and  possessed  of  great 
innate  dignity,  veiled  only  by  delightful,  incom 
parable  gifts  and  charms. 

Our  acquaintance  and  friendship  with  him 
lasted  through  many  years,  beginning  with  my 
husband's  early  association.  I  think  their  ac 
quaintance  began  about  the  time  when  the  doc 
tor  threatened  to  hang  out  a  sign,  "  The  small 
est  fevers  gratefully  received,"  and  when  the 
young  publisher's  literary  enthusiasm  led  him  to 
make  some  excuse  for  asking  medical  advice. 

The  very  first  letter  I  find  in  Dr.  Holmes's 
handwriting  is  the  following  amusing  note  ac 
companying  the  manuscript  copy  of  "  Astraea  : 
The  Balance  of  Illusions."  The  note  possibly 
alludes  to  "Astraea"  as  the  poem  to  be  written. 

$100.00. 

MY  DEAR  SIR,  —  The  above  is  an  argument 
of  great  weight  to  all  those  who,  like  the  late 
John  Rogers,  are  surrounded  by  a  numerous 
family. 

I  will  incubate  this  golden  egg  two  days,  and 
present  you  with  the  resulting  chicken  upon  the 
third.  Yours  very  truly, 

O.  W.  HOLMES. 


OLIVER  WENDELL   HOLMES  113 

P.  S.  You  will  perceive  that  the  last  sen 
tence  is  figurative,  and  implies  that  I  shall 
watch  and  fast  over  your  proposition  for  forty- 
eight  hours.  But  I  couldn't  on  any  account 
be  so  sneaky  as  to  get  up  and  recite  poor  old 
"  Hanover  "  over  again.  Oh,  no  !  If  anything, 
it  must  be  of  the  "paullo  majora." 

"Silvae  sint  consule  dignae."  Let  us  have  a 
brand-new  poem  or  none. 

Yours  as  on  the  preceding  page. 

The  next  letters  which  I  find  as  having  passed 
between  the  two  friends  are  dated  in  the  year 
1851,  and  it  must  have  been  about  this  period 
that  their  relations  began  to  grow  closer.  In 
every  succeeding  year  they  became  more  and 
more  intimate ;  and  when  death  interrupted 
their  communication,  Dr.  Holmes' s  untiring 
kindness  to  me  continued  to  the  end.  Unfor 
tunately  for  this  record,  the  friendship  was  not 
maintained  by  correspondence.  Common  in 
terests  brought  the  two  men  together  almost 
daily,  long  before  Dr.  Holmes  bought  a  house 
in  Charles  Street  within  a  few  doors  of  our 
own,  and  such  contiguity  made  correspondence 
to  any  great  extent  unnecessary. 

The  removal  from  Montgomery  Place,  where 
he  had  lived  some  years,  to  Charles  Street  was 
a  matter  of  great  concern.  He  says  in  the 
"Autocrat"  that  "he  had  no  idea  until  he 
pulled  up  his  domestic  establishment  what  an 


H4          OLIVER  WENDELL   HOLMES 

enormous  quantity  of  roots  he  had  been  making 
during  the  years  he  had  been  planted  there." 
Before  announcing  his  intention,  he  came  early 
one  morning,  with  his  friend  Lothrop  Motley,  to 
inspect  our  house,  which  was  similar  to  the  one 
he  thought  of  buying.  I  did  not  know  his  inten 
tion  at  the  time,  but  I  was  delighted  with  his 
enthusiasm  for  the  view  over  Charles  River  Bay, 
which  in  those  days  was  wider  and  more  beauti 
ful  than  it  can  ever  be  again.  Nothing  would 
satisfy  him  but  to  go  to  the  attic,  which  he  de 
clared,  if  it  were  his,  he  should  make  his  study. 
Shortly  after,  the  doctor  took  possession  of 
his  new  house,  but  characteristically  made  no 
picturesque  study  in  which  to  live.  He  passed 
many  long  days  and  evenings,  even  in  summer, 
in  a  lower  room  opening  on  the  street,  which 
wore  the  air  of  a  physician's  office,  and  solaced 
his  love  for  the  picturesque  by  an  occasional 
afternoon  at  his  early  home  in  Cambridge.  Of 
a  visit  to  this  latter  house  I  find  the  following 
description  in  my  note-book  :  "  Drove  out  in 
the  afternoon  and  overtook  Professor  Holmes  " 
(he  liked  to  be  called  "  Professor  "  then),  "  with 
his  wife  and  son,  who  were  all  on  their  way  to 
his  old  homestead  in  Cambridge.  They  asked 
us  to  go  there  with  them,  as  it  was  only  a  few 
steps  from  where  we  were.  The  professor  went 
to  the  small  side  door,  and  knocked  with  a  fine 
brass  knocker  which  had  just  been  presented  to 
him  from  the  old  Hancock  House.  It  was  de- 


OLIVER  WENDELL  HOLMES  115 

lightful  to  see  his  pleasure  in  everything  about 
the  old  house.  There  hung  a  portrait  of  his 
father,  Abiel  Holmes,  at  the  age  of  thirty- 
one,  —  a  beautiful  face  it  was ;  there  also  a 
picture  of  the  reverend  doctor's  first  wife,  fair, 
and  perhaps  a  trifle  coquettish,  or  what  the  pro 
fessor  called  '  a  little  romantic  ; '  the  old  chairs 
from  France  were  still  there ;  but  no  modern 
knickknacks  interfered  with  the  old-fashioned, 
quiet  effect  of  the  whole.  He  has  taken  for  his 
writing-room  the  former  parlor  looking  into  the 
garden.  He  loves  to  work  there,  and  he  and 
his  wife  evidently  spend  a  good  deal  of  time  at 
the  old  place.  There  is  a  legend  that  Wash 
ington  spent  three  nights  there,  and  that  Dr. 
Bradshaw  stepped  from  the  door  to  make  a 
prayer  upon  the  departure  of  the  troops  from 
that  point.  Behind  the  house  are  some  fine 
trees  where  we  sat  in  the  shade  talking  until 
the  shadows  grew  long  upon  the  grass." 

During  the  very  last  years  of  Dr.  Holmes's  life 
he  used  to  talk  often  of  the  old  Cambridge  home 
and  the  days  of  his  childhood  there.  "I  can 
remember,  when  I  shut  my  eyes,"  he  said  one 
day,  "just  as  if  it  were  yesterday,  how  beauti 
ful  it  was  looking  out  of  the  windows  of  my 
father's  house,  how  bright  and  sunshiny  the 
Common  was  in  front,  and  the  figures  which 
came  and  went  of  persons  familiar  to  me.  One 
day  some  one  said,  '  There  go  Russell  Sturgis 
and  his  bride ; '  and  I  looked,  and  saw  what  ap- 


Ii6          OLIVER   WENDELL   HOLMES 

peared  to  me  then  two  radiant  beings !  All 
this  came  back  to  me  as  I  read  a  volume  of  his 
reminiscences  lately  privately  printed,  not  pub 
lished,  by  his  children." 

Dr.  Holmes' s  out-of-door  life  was  not  limited, 
however,  to  his  excursions  to  Cambridge.  Early 
in  the  morning,  sometimes  before  sunrise,  stand 
ing  at  my  bedroom  window  overlooking  the  bay, 
I  have  seen  his  tiny  skiff  moving  quickly  over 
the  face  of  the  quiet  water ;  or,  later,  drifting 
down  idly  with  the  tide,  as  if  his  hour  of  exer 
cise  was  over,  and  he  was  now  dreamily  floating 
homeward  while  he  drank  in  the  loveliness  of 
the  morning.  Sometimes  the  waves  were  high 
and  rough,  and  adventures  were  to  be  had  ; 
then  every  muscle  was  given  a  chance,  and  he 
would  return  to  breakfast  tired  but  refreshed. 
There  was  little  to  be  learned  about  a  skiff  and 
its  management  which  he  did  not  acquire.  He 
knew  how  many  pounds  a  boat  ought  to  weigh, 
and  every  detail  respecting  it.  In  the  "  Auto 
crat  "  he  says,  — "  My  present  fleet  on  the 
Charles  River  consists  of  three  rowboats  :  I. 
A  small  flat-bottomed  skiff  of  the  shape  of  a 
flat-iron,  kept  mainly  to  lend  to  boys.  2.  A 
fancy  '  dory '  for  two  pairs  of  sculls,  in  which  I 
sometimes  go  out  with  my  young  folks.  3.  My 
own  particular  water-sulky,  a  '  skeleton '  or 
'  shell '  race-boat,  twenty-two  feet  long,  with 
huge  outriggers,  which  boat  I  pull  with  ten-foot 
sculls,  alone,  of  course,  as  it  holds  but  one,  and 


OLIVER   WENDELL   HOLMES  117 

tips  him  out  if  he  does  not  mind  what  he  is 
about."  The  description  is  all  delightful,  and 
a  little  later  on  there  is  a  reference  to  such  a 
morning  as  I  have  already  attempted  to  recall. 
"  I  dare  not  publicly  name  the  rare  joys,"  he 
says,  "  the  infinite  delights,  that  intoxicate  me 
on  some  sweet  June  morning  when  the  river 
and  bay  are  smooth  as  a  sheet  of  beryl-green 
silk,  and  I  run  along  ripping  it  up  with  my 
knife-edged  shell  of  a  boat,  the  rent  closing 
after  me,  like  those  wounds  of  angels  which 
Milton  tells  of,  but  the  seam  still  shining  for 
many  a  long  rood  behind  me.  ...  To  take 
shelter  from  the  sunbeams  under  one  of  the 
thousand-footed  bridges,  and  look  down  its  in 
terminable  colonnades,  crusted  with  green  and 
oozy  growths,  studded  with  minute  barnacles, 
and  belted  with  rings  of  dark  muscles,  while 
overhead  streams  and  thunders  that  other  river 
whose  every  wave  is  a  human  soul  flowing  to 
eternity  as  the  river  below  flows  to  the  ocean,  — 
lying  there,  moored  unseen,  in  loneliness  so  pro 
found  that  the  columns  of  Tadmor  in  the  desert 
could  not  seem  more  remote  from  life,  —  the 
cool  breeze  on  one's  forehead,  —  ...  why 
should  I  tell  of  these  things  !  " 

Since  the  Autocrat  has  himself  told  the  story 
of  this  episode  so  beautifully,  no  one  else  need 
attempt  it.  He  drank  in  the  very  wine  of  life 
with  the  air  of  those  summer  mornings. 

Returning  to  some  of   Dr.   Holmes's  early 


n8          OLIVER   WENDELL   HOLMES 

letters,  written  before  he  moved  to  Charles 
Street,  I  find  him  addressing  his  correspondent 
from  Pittsfield,  where  for  seven  years  he  enjoyed 
a  country  house  in  summer.  "  But,"  he  said 
one  day  many  years  later,  "  a  country  house,  you 
will  remember,  has  been  justly  styled  by  Balzac 
*  une plaie  ouverte?  There  is  no  end  to  the  ex 
penses  it  entails.  I  was  very  anxious  to  have  a 
country  retreat,  and  when  my  wife  had  a  small 
legacy  of  about  two  thousand  dollars  a  good 
many  years  ago,  we  thought  we  would  put  up 
a  perfectly  plain  shelter  with  that  money  on  a 
beautiful  piece  of  ground  we  owned  in  Pittsfield. 
Well,  the  architect  promised  to  put  the  house 
up  for  that.  But  it  cost  just  twice  as  much,  to 
begin  with  ;  that  was  n't  much  !  Then  we  had 
to  build  a  barn ;  then  we  wanted  a  horse  and 
carryall  and  wagon  ;  so  one  thing  led  to  another, 
and  it  was  too  far  away  for  me  to  look  after  it, 
and  at  length,  after  seven  years,  we  sold  it.  I 
could  n't  bear  to  think  of  it  or  to  speak  of  it  for 
a  long  time.  I  loved  the  trees,  and  while  our 
children  were  little  it  was  a  good  place  for  them  ; 
but  we  had  to  sell  it ;  and  it  was  better  in  the 
end,  although  I  felt  lost  without  it  for  a  great 
while."  Here  is  a  letter  from  Pittsfield  which 
describes  him  there  upon  his  arrival  one  year  in 
spring  :  — 

PITTSFIELD,  June  13,  1852. 

MY  DEAR  MR.  FIELDS,  —  I  have  just  received 
your  very  interesting  note,  and  the  proof  which 


OLIVER  WENDELL  HOLMES  119 

accompanied  it.  I  don't  know  when  I  ever 
read  anything  about  myself  that  struck  me  so 
piquantly  as  that  story  about  the  old  gentleman. 
It  is  almost  too  good  to  be  true,  but  you  are  not 
in  the  habit  of  quizzing.  The  trait  is  so  nature 
like  and  Dickens-like,  no  American  —  no  liv 
ing  soul  but  a  peppery,  crotchety,  good-hearted, 
mellow  old  John  Bull  —  could  have  done  such  a 
thing.  God  bless  him  !  Perhaps  the  verses  are 
not  much,  and  perhaps  he  is  no  great  judge 
whether  they  are  or  not  :  but  what  a  pleasant 
thing  it  is  to  win  the  hearty  liking  of  any  honest 
creature  who  is  neither  your  relation  nor  com 
patriot,  and  who  must  fancy  what  pleases  him 
for  itself  and  nothing  else ! 

I  will  not  say  what  pleasure  I  have  received 
from  Miss  Mitford's  kind  words.  I  am  going 
to  sit  down,  and  write  her  a  letter  with  a  good 
deal  of  myself  in  it,  which  I  am  quite  sure  she 
will  read  with  indulgence,  if  not  with  gratifica 
tion.  If  you  see  her,  or  write  to  her,  be  sure 
to  let  her  know  that  she  must  make  up  her 
mind  to  such  a  letter  as  she  will  have  to  sit 
down  to. 

I  am  afraid  I  have  not  much  of  interest  for 
you.  It  is  a  fine  thing  to  see  one's  trees  and 
things  growing,  but  not  so  much  to  tell  of.  I 
have  been  a  week  in  the  country  now,  and  am 
writing  at  this  moment  amidst  such  a  scintilla 
tion  of  fireflies  and  chorus  of  frogs  as  a  cock 
ney  would  cross  the  Atlantic  to  enjoy.  During 


120          OLIVER   WENDELL  HOLMES 

the  past  winter  I  have  done  nothing  but  lecture, 
having  delivered  between  seventy  and  eighty  all 
round  the  country  from  Maine  to  western  New 
York,  and  even  confronted  the  critical  terrors 
of  the  great  city  that  holds  half  a  million  and 

P M .      All  this  spring  I  have  been 

working  on  microscopes,  so  that  it  is  only  with 
in  a  few  days  I  have  really  got  hold  of  anything 
to  read  —  to  say  nothing  of  writing,  except  for 
my  lyceum  audiences.  I  had  a  literary  rencontre 
just  before  I  came  away,  however,  in  the -shape 
of  a  dinner  at  the  Revere  House  with  Griswold 
and  Epes  Sargent.  What  a  curious  creature 
Griswold  is  !  He  seems  to  me  a  kind  of  natural 
ist  whose  subjects  are  authors,  whose  memory 
is  a  perfect  fauna  of  all  flying,  running,  and 
creeping  things  that  feed  on  ink.  Epes  has  done 
mighty  well  with  his  red  -  edged  school  -  book, 
which  is  a  very  creditable-looking  volume,  to  say 
the  least. 

It  would  be  hard  to  tell  how  much  you  are 
missed  among  us.  I  really  do  not  know  who 
would  make  a  greater  blank  if  he  were  ab 
stracted.  As  for  myself,  I  have  been  all  lost 
since  you  have  been  away  in  all  that  relates  to 
literary  matters,  to  say  nothing  of  the  almost 
daily  aid,  comfort,  and  refreshment  I  imbibed 
from  your  luminous  presence.  Do  come  among 
us  as  soon  as  you  can  ;  and  having  come,  stay 
among  your  devoted  friends,  of  whom  count 

O.  W.  HOLMES. 


OLIVER   WENDELL   HOLMES  121 

From  this  letter  also  we  get  a  glimpse  of  the 
literary  world  of  New  England  at  that  time,  and 
an  idea  of  his  own  occupations. 

By  degrees,  as  the  intimacy  between  the  two 
friends  and  neighbors  grew  closer,  we  find  the 
publisher  asking  his  opinion  of  certain  manu 
scripts.  I  have  no  means  of  knowing  who  was 
the  author  of  the  poems  frankly  described  in 
the  following  note,1  but  one  can  only  wish  that 
writers,  especially  young  writers,  could  some 
times  see  themselves  in  such  a  glass  —  not 

darkly ! 

8  MONTGOMERY  PLACE,  July  24,  1857. 

MY  DEAR  MR.  FIELDS,  —  I  return  the  three 
poems  you  sent  me,  having  read  them  with 
much  gratification.  Each  of  them  has  it's  pecu 
liar  merits  and  defects,  as  it  seems  to  me,  but 
all  show  poetical  feeling  and  artistic  skill. 

"  Sleep  On  !  "  is  the  freshest  and  most  indi 
vidual  in  its  character.  You  will  see  my  pen 
cil  comment  at  the  end  of  it.  "  Inkerman  "  is 
comparatively  slipshod  and  careless,  though  not 
without  lyric  fire  and  vivid  force  of  description. 

"  Raphael  Sanzio "  would  deserve  higher 
praise  if  it  were  not  so  closely  imitative. 

In  truth,  all  these  poems  have  a  genuine 
sound ;  they  are  full  of  poetical  thought,  and 
breathed  out  in  softly  modulated  words.  The 

1  The  name  of  the  writer  has  just  been  sent  to  me.  He 
was  George  H.  Miles,  Professor  of  English  Literature  at  St. 
Mary's  (Catholic)  College,  Baltimore,  Maryland. 


122          OLIVER  WENDELL  HOLMES 

music  of  "  Sleep  On ! "  is  very  sweet,  and  I 
have  never  seen  heroic  verse  in  which  the  rhyme 
was  less  obtrusive  or  the  rhythm  more  difflu 
ent.  Still  it  would  not  be  fair  to  speak  in  these 
terms  of  praise  without  pointing  out  the  trans 
parent  imitativeness  which  is  common  to  all 
these  poems. 

"  Inkerman  "  is  a  poetical  Macaulay  stewed. 
The  whole  flow  of  its  verse  and  resonant  pas 
sion  of  its  narrative  are  borrowed  from  the 
"Lays  of  Ancient  Rome."  There  are  many 
crashing  lines  in  it,  and  the  story  is  rather  dash 
ingly  told ;  but  it  is  very  inferior  in  polish,  and 
even  correctness,  to  both  the  other  poems.  I 
have  marked  some  of  its  errata. 

"Raphael,"  good  as  it  is,  is  nothing  more 
than  Browning  browned  over.  Every  turn  of 
expression,  and  the  whole  animus,  so  to  speak, 
is  taken  from  those  poetical  monologues  of  his. 
Call  it  an  imitation,  and  it  is  excellent. 

The  best  of  the  three  poems,  then,  is  "  Sleep 
On ! "  I  see  Keats  in  it,  and  one  or  both  of 
the  Brownings ;  but  though  the  form  is  bor 
rowed,  the  passion  is  genuine  —  the  fire  has 
passed  along  there,  and  the  verse  has  followed 
before  the  ashes  were  quite  cool. 

Talent,  certainly  ;  taste  very  fine  for  the  melo 
dies  of  language ;  deep,  quiet  sentiment.  Genius  ? 
If  beardless,  yea  ;  if  in  sable  silvered,  —  and  I 
think  this  cannot  be  a  very  young  hand,  — why, 
then  .  .  .  we  will  suspend  our  opinion. 

Faithfully  yours,  O.  W.  HOLMES. 


OLIVER   WENDELL  HOLMES          123 

I  find  several  amusing  personal  letters  of 
this  period  which  are  characteristic  enough  to 
be  preserved.  Among  them  is  the  following  : 

21  CHARLES  STREET,  July  6,  8:33  A.  M. 
Barometer  at 


MY  DEAR  FRIEND  AND  NEIGHBOR,  —  Your 
most  unexpected  gift,  which  is  not  a  mere  token 
of  remembrance,  but  a  permanently  valuable 
present,  is  making  me  happier  every  moment  I 
look  at  it.  It  is  so  pleasant  to  be  thought  of 
by  our  friends  when  they  have  so  much  to  draw 
their  thoughts  away  from  us  ;  it  is  so  pleas 
ant,  too,  to  find  that  they  have  cared  enough 
about  us  to  study  our  special  tastes,  —  that  you 
can  see  why  your  beautiful  gift  has  a  growing 
charm  for  me.  Only  Mrs.  Holmes  thinks  it 
ought  to  be  in  the  parlor  among  the  things  for 
show,  and  I  think  it  ought  to  be  in  the  study, 
where  I  can  look  at  it  at  least  once  an  hour 
every  day  of  my  life. 

I  have  observed  some  extraordinary  move 
ments  of  the  index  of  the  barometer  during 
the  discussions  that  ensued,  which  you  may  be 
interested  enough  to  see  my  notes  of. 

BAROMETER. 

Mrs.  H. 

My  dear,  we  shall  of  course  keep 
this  beautiful  barometer  in  the  parlor. 

Fair. 
Dr.  H. 

Why,  no,  my  dear;    the  study  is 
the  place.  Dry. 


124  OLIVER   WENDELL   HOLMES 

Mrs.  H. 

I  'm  sure  it  ought  to  go  in  the 
parlor.  It 's  too  handsome  for  your 
old  den.  Change. 

Dr.H. 

I  shall  keep  it  in  the  study.  Very  dry. 

Mrs.H. 

I  don't  think  that 's  fair.  Rain. 

Dr.H. 

I  'm  sorry.     Can't  help  it.  Very  dry. 

Mrs.  H. 

It 's  —  too  —  too  —  ba-a-ad.  Much  -rain. 

Dr.H. 

(Music  omitted.) 

'Mid  pleas-ures  and  paaal-a-a-c-es.  Set  Fair. 
Mrs.  H. 

I  will  have  it !     You  horrid  —        Stormy. 

You  see  what  a  wonderful  instrument  this  is 
that  you  have  given  me.  But,  my  dear  Mr. 
Fields,  while  I  watch  its  changes  it  will  be  a 
constant  memorial  of  unchanging  friendship ; 
and  while  the  dark  hand  of  fate  is  traversing 
the  whole  range  of  mortal  vicissitudes,  the 
golden  index  of  the  kind  affections  shall  stand 
always  at  SET  FAIR.  Yours  ever, 

O.  W.  HOLMES. 

There  are  many  notes  also  showing  how  the 
two  friends  played  into  each  other's  hands. 
This  one  is  a  sample :  — 


OLIVER  WENDELL   HOLMES  125 

21  CHARLES  STREET,  July  17,  1864. 

MY  DEAR  MR.  FIELDS,  —  Can  you  tell  me 
anything  that  will  get  this  horrible  old  woman 

of  the  C California  off  from  my  shoulders  ? 

Do  you  know  anything  about  this  pestilent  man 
uscript  she  raves  about  ?  This  continent  is  not 
big  enough  for  me  and  her  together,  and  if  she 
does  n't  jump  into  the  Pacific  I  shall  have  to  leap 
into  the  Atlantic  —  I  mean  the  original  damp 
spot  so  called.  Yours  always, 

O.  W.  HOLMES. 

P.  S.  To  avoid  the  necessity  of  the  latter, 
I  have  written  to  her,  cordially  recommending 
suicide  as  adapted  to  her  case. 

Surely  there  must  have  been  something  pe 
culiarly  exasperating  about  this  applicant  for 
literary  honors,  because  Dr.  Holmes  erred,  if 
at  all,  in  the  opposite  direction.  He  was  far 
more  apt  to  write  and  to  behave  as  the  follow 
ing  note  recommends  :  "  Will  you  read  this 
young  lady's  story,  and  let  me  know  what  you 
propose  to  do  with  it  ?  A  young  woman  of 
tender  feelings,  I  think,  and  to  be  treated  very 
kindly."  Again  :  "Will  it  be  too  late  for  a  few 
paragraphs  about  Forceythe  Willson  ?  If  not, 
in  what  paper  ?  And  can  you  tell  me  any 
thing  ?  Will  you  do  it  yourself  ?  " 

The  number  of  these  notes  is  legion,  bring 
ing  every  variety  of  form  and  subject  and  prob- 


126  OLIVER  WENDELL   HOLMES 

lem  to  his  friend  as  editor  or  publisher,  or  for 
private  advice.  In  one  of  them  he  says,  "  Please 
give  me  your  grandpaternal  council."  But  I 
have  quoted  enough  upon  this  head  to  give  an 
idea  of  the  kind  and  busy  brain  not  too  deeply 
immersed  in  its  own  projects  to  have  a  tender 
regard  for  those  of  others. 

Meanwhile  his  own  work  was  continually 
progressing.  Lowell  had  already  made  him 
feel  that  he  was  the  mainspring  of  the  "  Atlan 
tic,"  which  at  the  time  of  the  war  attained  the 
height  of  its  popularity,  and  achieved  a  position 
where  it  found  no  peer.  The  care  which  Dr. 
Holmes  bestowed  upon  the  finish  of  his  work, 
the  endless  labor  over  its  details,  are  almost 
inconceivable  when  we  remember  that  "this 
power  of  taking  pains,"  which  Carlyle  calls  one 
of  the  attributes  of  genius,  was  combined  with 
a  gay,  mercurial  temperament  ready  to  take  fire 
at  every  chance  spark. 

One  Sunday  afternoon  in  the  sad  spring  of 
1864,  during  the  terrible  days  of  the  war,  he 
came  in  to  correct  a  poem.  "  I  am  ashamed," 
he  said,  "to  be  troubled  by  so  slight  a  thing 
when  battles  are  raging  about  us ;  but  I  have 
written  :  — 

Where  Genoa's  deckless  caravels  were  blown. 

Now  Columbus  sailed  from  Palos,  and  I  must 
change  the  verse  before  it  is  too  late." 

This  habit  of  always  doing  his  best  is  surely 


OLIVER  WENDELL   HOLMES  127 

one  of  the  fine  lessons  of  his  life.  It  has  given 
his  prose  a  perfection  which  will  carry  it  far 
down  the  shores  of  time.  The  letter  sent  dur 
ing  the  last  summer  of  his  life  to  be  read  at 
the  celebration  of  Bryant's  birthday  was  a  model 
of  simplicity  in  the  expression  of  feeling.  It 
was  brief,  and  at  another  time  would  have  been 
written  and  revised  in  half  a  day ;  but  in  his 
enfeebled  condition  it  was  with  the  utmost  diffi 
culty  that  he  ceuld  satisfy  himself.  He  worked 
at  it  patiently  day  after  day,  until  his  labor  be 
came  a  pain ;  nevertheless,  he  continued,  and 
won  what  he  deserved  —  the  applause  of  men 
practiced  in  his  art  who  were  there  to  listen 
and  appreciate. 

Any  record  of  Dr.  Holmes's  life  would  be 
imperfect  which  contained  no  mention  of  the 
pride  and  pleasure  he  felt  in  the  Saturday  Club. 
Throughout  the  forty  years  of  its  prime  he  was 
not  only  the  most  brilliant  talker  of  that  dis 
tinguished  company,  but  he  was  also  the  most 
faithful  attendant.  He  was  seldom  absent  from 
the  monthly  dinners  either  in  summer  or  in 
winter,  and  he  lived  to  find  himself  at  the  head 
of  the  table  where  Agassiz,  Longfellow,  Em 
erson,  and  Lowell  had  in  turn  preceded  him. 
Could  a  shorthand  writer  have  been  secretly 
present  at  those  dinners,  what  a  delightful  book 
of  wise  talk  and  witty  sayings  would  now  lie 
open  before  us  !  Fragments  of  the  good  things 
were  sometimes  brought  away,  as  loving  parents 


128         OLIVER   WENDELL   HOLMES 

bring  sugar-plums  from  a  feast  to  the  children 
at  home  ;  but  they  are  only  fragments,  and  bear 
out  but  inefficiently  the  reputation  which  has 
run  before  them.  The  following  pathetic  inci 
dent,  related  on  one  of  those  occasions  by  Dr. 
Holmes,  need  not,  however,  be  omitted  :  — 

"Just  forty  years  ago,"  he  said  one  day,  "I 
was  whipped  at  school  for  a  slight  offense  — 
whipped  with  a  ferule  right  across  my  hands, 
so  that  I  went  home  with  a  blue  mark  where 
the  blood  had  settled,  and  for  a  fortnight  my 
hands  were  stiff  and  swollen  from  the  blows. 
The  other  day  an  old  man  called  at  my  house 
and  inquired  for  me.  He  was  bent,  and  could 
just  creep  along.  When  he  came  in  he  said : 
1  How  do  you  do,  sir  ;  do  you  recollect  your 

old  teacher  Mr.  ? '    I  did,  perfectly !    He 

sat  and  talked  awhile  about  indifferent  sub 
jects,  but  I  saw  something  rising  in  his  throat, 
and  I  knew  it  was  that  whipping.  After  a. 
while  he  said,  *  I  came  to  ask  your  forgiveness 
for  whipping  you  once  when  I  was  in  anger ; 
perhaps  you  have  forgotten  it,  but  I  have  not.' 
It  had  weighed  upon  his  mind  all  these  years  ! 
He  must  be  rid  of  it  before  lying  down  to  sleep 
peacefully." 

Speaking  of  dining  at  Taft's,  an  excellent 
eating-house  at  Point  Shirley  for  fish  and  game, 
Dr.  Holmes  said  :  "  The  host  himself  is  worth 
seeing.  He  is  the  one  good  uncooked  thing  at 
his  table." 


OLIVER   WENDELL   HOLMES  129 

He  had  been  to  Philadelphia  with  one  of  his 
lectures,  but  he  did  not  have  a  free  chance 
at  any  conversation  afterward.  "I  did  go  to 
Philadelphia,"  he  said,  "  with  one  remark,  but  I 
brought  it  back  unspoken.  It  struck  in." 

Soon  after  Dr.  Holmes' s  removal  to  Charles 
Street  began  a  long  series  of  early  morning 
breakfasts  at  his  publisher's  house  —  feasts  of 
the  simplest  kind.  Many  strangers  came  to 
Boston  in  those  days,  on  literary  or  historical 
errands  —  men  of  tastes  which  brought  them 
sooner  or  later  to  the  "  Old  Corner  "  where  the 
"  Atlantic  Monthly"  was  already  a  power.  Of 
course  one  of  the  first  pleasures  sought  for  was 
an  interview  with  Dr.  Holmes,  the  fame  of 
whose  wit  ripened  early  —  even  before  the  days 
of  the  "Autocrat."  It  came  about  quite  natu 
rally,  therefore,  that  they  should  gladly  respond 
to  any  call  which  gave  them  the  opportunity  to 
listen  to  his  conversation  ;  and  the  eight-o'clock 
breakfast  hour  was  chosen  as  being  the  only 
time  the  busy  guests  and  host  could  readily  call 
their  own.  Occasionally  these  breakfasts  would 
take  place  as  frequently  as  two  or  three  times  a 
week.  The  light  of  memory  has  a  wondrous 
gift  of  heightening  most  of  the  pleasures  of 
this  life,  but  the  conversation  of  those  early 
hours  was  far  more  stimulating  and  inspiring 
than  any  memory  of  it  can  ever  be.  There 
were  few  men,  except  Poe,  famous  in  American 
or  English  literature  of  that  era  who  did  not  ap- 


130  OLIVER   WENDELL   HOLMES 

pear  once  at  least.  The  unexpectedness  of  the 
company  was  a  great  charm  ;  for  a  brief  period 
Boston  enjoyed  a  sense  of  cosmopolitanism,  and 
found  it  possible,  as  it  is  really  possible  only  in 
London,  to  bring  together  busy  guests  with  full 
and  eager  brains  who  are  not  too  familiar  with 
one  another's  thought  to  make  conversation  an 
excitement  and  a  source  of  development. 

Of  Dr.  Holmes' s  talk  on  these  occasions  it 
is  impossible  to  give  any  satisfactory  record. 
The  simple  conditions  of  his  surroundings  gave 
him  a  sense  of  perfect  ease,  and  he  spoke  with 
the  freedom  which  marked  his  nature.  It  was 
one  of  the  charms  by  which  he  drew  men  to 
himself  that  he  not  only  wore  a  holiday  air  of 
finding  life  full  and  interesting,  but  that  he  be 
lieved  in  freedom  of  speech  for  himself,  and 
therefore  wished  to  find  it  in  others.  This 
emancipation  in  expression  did  not  extend  al 
together  into  the  practical  working  of  his  life 
Conventionalities  had  a  strong  hold  upon  him. 
He  loved  to  avoid  the  great  world  when  it  was 
inconvenient,  and  to  get  a  certain  freedom  out 
side  of  it ;  but  once  in  the  current,  the  manners 
of  the  Romans  were  his  own.  He  reminded 
one  sometimes  of  Hawthorne's  saying  that  "in 
these  days  men  are  born  in  their  clothes,"  al 
though  Dr.  Holmes's  conventions  were  more 
easily  shuffled  off  than  a  casual  observer  would 
believe.  Nothing  could  be  farther  from  the 
ordinary  idea  of  the  romantic  "  man  of  genius  " 


OLIVER  WENDELL  HOLMES  131 

than  was  his  well-trimmed  little  figure,  and 
nothing  more  surprising  and  delightful  than 
the  way  in  which  his  childlikeness  of  nature 
would  break  out  and  assert  itself.  He  declared 
one  morning  that  he  had  discovered  the  hap 
piest  animal  in  creation  —  "  next  to  a  poet,  of 
course,  if  we  may  call  him  an  animal ;  it  is  the 
acheron,  the  parasite  of  the  honey-bee.  And 
why  ?  Because  he  attaches  himself  to  the  wing 
of  the  bee,  is  carried  without  exertion  to  the 
sweetest  flowers,  where  the  bee  gathers  the 
honey  while  the  acheron  eats  it ;  and  all  the 
while  the  music  of  the  bee  attends  him  as  he  is 
borne  through  the  air." 

He  met  Hawthorne  for  the  first  time,  I  think, 
in  this  informal  way.  Holmes  had  been  speak 
ing  of  Renan,  whose  books  interested  him. 

"  A  long  while  ago,"  he  began,  "  I  said  Rome 
or  Reason  ;  now  I  am  half  inclined  to  put  it, 
Rome  or  Renan."  Then  suddenly  turning  to 
Hawthorne,  he  said,  "By  the  way,  I  would 
write  a  new  novel  if  you  were  not  in  the  field, 
Mr.  Hawthorne."  "I  am  not,"  said  Haw 
thorne  ;  "  and  I  wish  you  would  do  it."  There 
was  a  moment's  silence.  Holmes  said  quickly, 
"  I  wish  you  would  come  to  the  club  oftener." 
"I  should  like  to,"  said  Hawthorne,  "  but  I 
can't  drink."  "  Neither  can  I."  "  Well,  but  I 
can't  eat."  "  Nevertheless,  we  should  like  to 
see  you."  "  But  I  can't  talk,  either."  After 
which  there  was  a  shout  of  laughter.  Then 


132  OLIVER   WENDELL   HOLMES 

said  Holmes,  "  You  can  listen,  though  ;  and  I 
wish  you  would  come." 

On  another  occasion,  when  Lowell  was  pres 
ent,  he  was  talking  of  changes  in  physical  con 
ditions.  Dr.  Holmes  said,  now,  at  the  age  of 
fifty-four,  he  could  eat  almost  anything  set 
before  him,  which  he  could  by  no  means  do 
formerly.  Lowell  found  opportunity  somehow 
at  this  point  to  laugh  at  Holmes  for  having 
lately  said  in  print  that  "Beecher  was  a  man 
whose  thinking  marrow  was  not  corrugated  by 
drink  or  embrowned  by  meerschaum."  Lowell 
said  he  had  no  "  thinking  marrow,"  and  objected 
to  such  anatomical  terms  applied  to  the  best 
part  of  a  man. 

By  and  by  Lowell  came  out  of  his  critical 
mood,  and  said  pleasantly,  after  some  talk  upon 
lyric  poetry  in  general,  "  I  like  your  lyrics,  you 
know,  Holmes."  "Well,"  said  Holmes,  pleased, 
but  speaking  earnestly  and  with  a  childlike  hon 
esty,  "  but  there  is  something  too  hopping  about 
them.  To  tell  the  truth,  nothing  has  injured 
my  reputation  so  much  as  the  too  great  praise 
which  has  been  bestowed  upon  my  '  windfalls.' 
After  all,  the  value  of  a  poet  to  the  world  is  not 
so  much  his  reputation  as  a  writer  of  this  or 
that  poem,  as  the  fact  that  the  poet  is  known  to 
be  one  who  is  rapt  out  of  himself  at  times,  and 
carried  away  into  the  region  of  the  divine ;  it  is 
known  that  the  spirit  has  descended  upon  him, 
and  taught  him  what  he  should  speak." 


OLIVER   WENDELL   HOLMES  133 

Holmes's  admiration  of  Dickens's  genius  was 
very  sincere.  "He  is  the  greatest  of  all  of 
them,"  he  loved  to  say.  "  Such  fertility,  such 
Shakespearean  breadth,  —  there  is  enough  of 
him ;  you  feel  as  you  do  when  you  see  the 
ocean." 

Speaking  of  the  difficulty  of  being  a  good  lis 
tener,  he  said  that  it  was  a  terrible  responsibil 
ity  for  him  to  listen  to  a  story.  He  could  never 
be  rid  of  the  feeling  that  he  must  remember 
accurately,  or  all  would  be  lost.  There  was  one 
story  in  particular,  told  by  a  friend  remarkable 
as  a  raconteur,  which  tried  him  more  than  any 
thing  he  knew  in  the  world,  —  of  the  kind.  He 
felt  like  one  of  the  old  Greek  chorus  with 
strophe  and  antistrophe,  and  it  was  a  weight 
upon  his  mind  lest  he  should  not  laugh  properly 
at  the  end. 

I  recall  one  day,  when  the  subject  of  Walt 
Whitman's  poetry  was  introduced,  Dr.  Holmes 
said  he  abhorred  playing  the  critic,  partly  be 
cause  he  was  not  a  good  reader,  —  had  read 
too  cursorily  and  carelessly ;  but  he  thought 
the  right  thing  had  not  been  said  about  Walt 
Whitman.  "His  books  sell  largely,  and  there 
is  a  large  audience  of  friends  in  Washington 
who  praise  and  listen.  Emerson  believes  in 
him  ;  Lowell  not  at  all ;  Longfellow  finds  some 
good  in  his  '  yaup  ; '  but  the  truth  is,  he  is  in  an 
amorphous  condition." 

Longfellow  was  once  speaking  of  an  address 


134          OLIVER  WENDELL  HOLMES 

he  had  heard  which  he  considered  quite  a 
perfect  performance.  "  Yes — yes,"  said  Dr. 
Holmes  ;  "  I  don't  doubt  it  was  very  good  ;  but 
the  speaker  is  such  an  unpleasant  person !  He 
is  just  one  of  those  fungi  that  always  grow 
upon  universities." 

The  following  extract  is  from  a  brief  diary : 

"  Charles  Sumner,  Longfellow,  Greene,  Dr. 
Holmes,  came  to  dine.  The  latter  sparkled  and 
coruscated  as  I  have  seldom  heard  him  before. 
We  are  more  than  ever  convinced  that  no  one 
since  Sydney  Smith  was  ever  so  brilliant,  so 
witty,  spontaneous,  naff,  and  unfailing  as  he." 

In  speaking  of  his  own  class  in  college  he 
said  :  "  There  never  was  such  vigor  in  any  class 
before,  it  seems  to  me.  Almost  every  member 
turns  out  sooner  or  later  distinguished  for  some 
thing.  We  have  had  every  grade  of  moral  sta 
tus  from  a  criminal  to  a  chief  justice,  and  we 
never  let  any  one  of  them  drop.  We  keep  hold 
of  their  hands  year  after  year,  and  lift  up  the 
weak  and  failing  ones  till  they  are  at  last  re 
deemed.  Ah,  there  was  one  exception  !  Years 
ago  we  voted  to  cast  a  man  out  who  had  been 
a  defaulter  or  who  had  committed  some  offense 
of  that  nature.  The  poor  fellow  sank  down, 
and  before  the  next  year,  when  we  repented  of 
this  decision,  he  had  gone  too  far  down  and  pre 
sently  died.  But  we  have  kept  all  the  rest ! 

"  Every  fourth  man  in  our  class  is  a  poet. 
Sam.  Smith  belongs  to  our  class,  who  wrote 


OLIVER  WENDELL  HOLMES         135 

'  My  Country  't  is  of  Thee.'  Sam.  Smith  will 
live  when  Longfellow,  Whittier,  and  all  the  rest 
of  us  have  gone  into  oblivion.  .  .  . 

"  Queer  man, .  Looked  ten  years  older 

than  he  was,  like  Caliban.  Calibans  look  al 
ways  ten  years  older  than  they  are.  A  perfect 
potato  of  a  man.  If  five  hundred  pieces  of  a 
man  had  been  flung  together  from  different 
points  and  stuck,  they  could  not  have  been 
more  awkwardly  concocted  than  he  was. 

"James  Freeman  Clarke  was  in  our  class. 
Ever  read  his  history  of  the  '  Ten  Great  Reli 
gions  ? '  Very  good  book.  Nobody  knows 
how  much  Clarke  is  until  he  reads  that  book. 
How  he  surprises  us  from  time  to  time.  Came 
out  well  about  '  bolting,'  with  regard  to  Butler 
the  other  day.  Writes  good  verses,  too, — 
not  as  good  as  mine,  but  good  verses."  .  .  . 
Holmes  was  abstemious  and  never  ceased 
talking.  "  Most  men  write  too  much.  I  would 
rather  risk  my  future  fame  upon  one  lyric  than 
upon  ten  volumes.  But  I  have  said  '  Boston 
is  the  hub  of  the  Universe ; '  I  will  rest  upon 
that." 

He  spoke  also  with  great  feeling  of  the 
women  who  came  to  him  for  literary  advice  and 

assistance.  ,  he  says,  is  his  daughter  in 

letters.  He  has  only  seen  her  once,  but  he  has 
been  a  faithful  correspondent  and  assistant  to 
her. 

Sumner  said  some  one  had  called "an 


Ij6  OLIVER   WENDELL  HOLMES 

impediment  in  the  path  of  science."  What  did 
he  mean  ?  "  It  means  just  this,"  said  Holmes  : 

" is  no  longer  young,  and  I  was  reading  the 

other  day  in  a  book  on  the  Sandwich  Islands 
of  an  old  Fejee  man  who  had  been  carried 
away  among  strangers,  but  who  prayed  that  he 
might  be  carried  home  and  his  brains  beaten 
out  in  peace  by  his  son,  according  to  the  cus 
tom  of  those  lands.  It  flashed  over  me  then 
that  our  sons  beat  out  our  brains  in  the  same 
way.  They  do  not  walk  in  our  ruts  of  thought 
or  begin  exactly  where  we  leave  off,  but  they 
have  a  new  standpoint  of  their  own." 

The  talk  went  on  for  about  four  hours,  when 
the  company  broke  up. 

One  evening  the  doctor  came  in  after  the 
Phi  Beta  Kappa  dinner  at  Cambridge.  "  I  can't 
stop,"  he  said.  "  I  only  came  to  read  you  my 
verses  which  I  gave  at  the  dinner  to-day :  they 
made  such  a  queer  impression  !  I  did  n't  mean 
to  go,  but  James  Lowell  was  to  preside,  and 
sent  me  word  that  I  really  must  be  there,  so  I 
just  wrote  these  off,  and  here  they  are.  I  don't 
know  that  I  should  have  brought  them  in  to 
read  to  you,  but  Hoar  declares  they  are  the 
best  I  have  ever  done."  After  some  delay, 
and  in  the  fading  light  of  sunset  reflected  from 
the  river,  he  read  the  well-known  verses  "  Bill 
and  Joe."  He  must  have  been  still  warm  with 
the  excitement  of  the  first  reading,  for  I  can 
never  forget  the  tenderness  with  which  he  re- 


OLIVER  WENDELL   HOLMES  137 

cited  the  lines.  They  are  still  pleasant  on  the 
printed  page,  but  to  those  who  heard  him  they 
are  divested  of  the  passion  of  affection  with 
which  they  were  written  and  read. 

Late  in  life  he  said  to  a  friend  who  was  speak 
ing  of  the  warm  friendships  embalmed  in  his 
poetry,  and  which  would  help  to  make  it  en 
dure  :  "  I  don't  know  how  that  may  be  ;  but  the 
writing  of  these  poems  has  been  a  passionate 
joy." 

The  following  amusing  note  gives  a  picture 
of  Dr.  Holmes  in  his  most  natural  and  social 
mood :  — 

296  BEACON  STREET,  February  n,  1872. 

MY  DEAR  MR.  FIELDS,  — On  Friday  evening 
last  I  white-cravated  myself,  took  a  carriage, 
and  found  myself  at  your  door  at  8  of  the 
clock  P.  M. 

A  cautious  female  responded  to  my  ring,  and 
opened  the  chained  portal  about  as  far  as  a 
clam  opens  his  shell  to  see  what  is  going  on  in 
Cambridge  Street,  where  he  is  waiting  for  a 
customer. 

Her  first  glance  impressed  her  with  the  con 
viction  that  I  was  a  burglar.  The  mild  ad 
dress  with  which  I  accosted  her  removed  that 
impression,  and  I  rose  in  the  moral  scale  to  the 
comparatively  elevated  position  of  what  the  un 
feeling  world  calls  a  "sneak-thief." 

By  dint,  however,  of  soft  words,  and  that  look 


138          OLIVER  WENDELL  HOLMES 

of  ingenuous  simplicity  by  which  I  am  so  well 
known  to  you  and  all  my  friends,  I  coaxed 
her  into  the  belief  that  I  was  nothing  worse 
than  a  rejected  contributor,  an  autograph  collec 
tor,  an  author  with  a  volume  of  poems  to  dis 
pose  of,  or  other  disagreeable  but  not  dangerous 
character. 

She  unfastened  the  chain,  and  I  stood  before 
her. 

"  I  calmed  her  fears,  and  she  was  calm 
And  told" 

me  how  you  and  Mrs.  F.  had  gone  to  New 
York,  and  how  she  knew  nothing  of  any  liter 
ary  debauch  that  was  to  come  off  under  your 
roof,  but  would  go  and  call  another  unprotected 
female  who  knew  the  past,  present,  and  future, 
and  could  tell  me  why  this  was  thus,  that  I  had 
been  lured  from  my  fireside  by  the  ignis  fatuus 
of  a  deceptive  invitation. 

It  was  my  turn  to  be  afraid,  alone  in  the  house 
with  two  of  the  stronger  sex ;  and  I  retired. 

On  reaching  home,  I  read  my  note  and  found 
it  was  Friday  the  i6th,  not  the  Qth,  I  was  in 
vited  for.  .  .  . 

Dear  Mr.  Fields,  I  shall  be  very  happy  to 
come  to  your  home  on  Friday  evening,  the  i6th 
February,  at  8  o'clock,  to  meet  yourself  and 
Mrs.  Fields  and  hear  Mr.  James  read  his  paper 
on  Emerson.  Always  truly  yours, 

O.  W.  HOLMES. 

On  occasions  of  social  dignity  few  men  have 


OLIVER  WENDELL  HOLMES          139 

ever  surpassed  Dr.  Holmes  in  grace  of  compli 
ment  and  perfection  of  easy  ceremony.  It  was 
an  acquired  gift ;  perhaps  it  always  must  be. 
But  as  soon  as  human  nature  was  given  a 
chance  to  show  itself,  he  was  always  eager, 
bringing  an  unsated  store  of  intellectual  curi 
osity  to  bear  upon  every  new  person  or  condi 
tion.  He  was  generous  to  a  fault  in  showing 
his  own  hand,  moving  with  "infinite  jest "  over 
the  current  of  his  experiences  until  he  could 
tempt  his  interlocutor  out  upon  the  same  dan 
gerous  waters.  If  others  were  slow  to  embark, 
he  nevertheless  interested  them  in  the  history 
of  his  own  voyage  of  life. 

Dr.  Holmes  had  never  known  any  very  diffi 
cult  hand  to  hand  struggle  with  life,  but  he  was 
quite  satisfied  with  its  lesser  difficulties.  He 
could  laugh  at  his  own  want  of  courage,  as  he 
called  a  certain  lack  of  love  for  adventure,  and 
he  could  admire  the  daring  of  others.  He  was 
happy  in  the  circle  of  his  home  affections,  and 
never  cared  to  stray  faraway.  He  had  a  golden 
sense  of  comfort  in  his  home  life,  an  entire  satis 
faction,  which  made  his  rare  absences  a  penance. 
Added  to  this  was  his  tendency  to  asthma,  from 
which  he  suffered  often  very  severely.  In  a 
letter  written  in  1867  from  Montreal,  whither 
he  had  gone  to  obtain  a  copyright  of  one  of  his 
books,  we  can  see  how  his  domestic  habits,  as 
well  as  his  asthma,  made  any  long  absence  in 
tolerable  to  him. 


140          OLIVER  WENDELL  HOLMES 

MONTREAL,  October  23,  1867. 

DEAR  MR.  FIELDS  :  ...  I  am  as  comfortable 
here  as  I  can  be,  but  I  have  earned  my  money, 
for  I  have  had  a  full  share  of  my  old  trouble. 

Last  night  was  better,  and  to-day  I  am  go 
ing  about  the  town.  Miss  Frothingham  sent 
me  a  basket  of  black  Hamburg  grapes  to-day, 
which  were  very  grateful  after  the  hotel  tea  and 
coffee  and  other  'pothecary's  stuff. 

Don't  talk  to  me  about  taverns !  There  is 
just  one  genuine,  clean,  decent,  palatable  thing 
occasionally  to  be  had  in  them,  —  namely,  a 
boiled  egg.  The  soups  taste  pretty  good  some 
times,  but  their  sources  are  involved  in  a  darker 
mystery  than  that  of  the  Nile.  Omelettes  taste 
as  if  they  had  been  carried  in  the  waiter's  hat, 
or  fried  in  an  old  boot.  I  ordered  scrambled 
eggs  one  day.  It  must  be  that  they  had  been 
scrambled  for  by  somebody,  but  who  —  who  in 
the  possession  of  a  sound  reason  could  have 
scrambled  for  what  I  had  set  before  me  under 
that  name  ?  Butter !  I  am  thinking  just  now 
of  those  exquisite  little  pellets  I  have  so  often 
seen  at  your  table,  and  wondering  why  the  tav 
erns  always  keep  it  until  it  is  old.  Fool  that 
I  am !  As  if  the  taverns  did  not  know  that  if 
it  was  good  it  would  be  eaten,  which  is  not 
what  they  want.  Then  the  waiters,  with  their 
napkins,  —  what  don't  they  do  with  those  nap 
kins  !  Mention  any  one  thing  of  which  you 


OLIVER   WENDELL   HOLMES  141 

think  you  can  say  with  truth,  "  That  they  do  not 
do."  ... 

I  have  a  really  fine  parlor,  but  every  time  I 
enter  it  I  perceive  that 

"  Still,  sad  'odor'  of  humanity" 

which  clings  to  it  from  my  predecessor.  Mr. 
Hogan  got  home  yesterday,  I  believe.  I  saw 
him  for  the  first  time  to-day.  He  was  civil  — 
they  all  are  civil.  I  have  no  fault  to  find  ex 
cept  with  taverns  here  and  pretty  much  every 
where. 

Every  six  months  a  tavern  should  burn  to 
the  ground,  with  all  its  traps,  its  "properties," 
its  beds  and  pots  and  kettles,  and  start  afresh 
from  its  ashes  like  John  Phoenix-Squibob. 

No ;  give  me  home,  or  a  home  like  mine, 
where  all  is  clean  and  sweet,  where  coffee  has 
preexisted  in  the  berry,  and  tea  has  still  faint 
recollections  of  the  pigtails  that  dangled  about 
the  plant  from  which  it  was  picked,  where  but 
ter  has  not  the  prevailing  character  which  Pope 
assigned  to  Denham,  where  soup  could  look  you 
in  the  face  if  it  had  "  eyes  "  (which  it  has  not), 
and  where  the  comely  Anne  or  the  gracious 
Margaret  takes  the  place  of  these  napkin-bear 
ing  animals. 

Enough  !  But  I  have  been  forlorn  and  ailing 
and  fastidious  —  but  I  am  feeling  a  little  better, 
and  can  talk  about  it.  I  had  some  ugly  nights, 
I  tell  you ;  but  I  am  writing  in  good  spirits,  as 


142          OLIVER  WENDELL  HOLMES 

you  see.  I  have  written  once  before  to  Low, 
as  I  think  I  told  you,  and  on  the  25th  mean  to 
go  to  a  notary  with  Mr.  Dawson,  as  he  tells  me 
it  is  the  right  thing  to  do. 

Yours  always,  O.  W.  H. 

P.  S.  Made  a  pretty  good  dinner,  after  all ; 
but  better  a  hash  at  home  than  a  roast  with 
strangers. 

With  much  the  same  experience  of  asthma 
as  a  result,  he  visited  Princeton  three  or  four 
years  later,  and  wrote  after  his  return  :  — 

296  BEACON  STREET,  August  24,  1871. 

MY  DEAR  FIELDS  :  .  .  .  I  only  sat  up  one 
whole  night,  it  is  true,  which  was  a  great  im 
provement  on  Montreal ;  but  I  do  not  feel  right 
yet,  and  it  is  quite  uncertain  whether  I  shall  be 
in  a  condition  to  enjoy  the  club  by  Saturday. 
So  if  I  come,  all  the  better  for  me ;  and  if  I 
don't  come,  you  can  say  that  you  have  in  your 
realm  at  Parker's  not  "  five  hundred  as  good  as 
he,"  but  a  score  or  so  that  will  serve  your  turn. 

I  cut  the  first  leaves  I  wanted  to  meddle  with 
in  the  last  "Atlantic"  for  No.  IX.  of  the 
"  Whispering  Gallery,"  and  took  it  all  down  like 
an  oyster  in  the  height  of  the  season.  It  is 
captivating,  like  all  the  rest.  Why  don't  you 
make  a  book  as  big  as  Allibone's  out  of  your 
store  of  unparalleled  personal  recollections  ?  It 


OLIVER  WENDELL  HOLMES          143 

seems  too  bad  to  keep  them  for  posterity.  When 
I  think  of  your  bequeathing  them  for  the  sole 
benefit  of  people  that  are  unborn,  I  want  to  cry 
out  with  Horace  :  — 

"  Eheu  —  Postume,  Postume  !  " 

Always  yours,  O.  W.  HOLMES. 

Again,  three  years  later,  he  writes  :  "I  hope 
you  are  reasonably  careful  of  yourself  during 
this  cold  weather.  Look  out !  A  hot  lecture- 
room,  a  cold  ride,  the  best-chamber  sheets  like 
slices  of  cucumber,  and  one  gives  one's  friends 
the  trouble  of  writing  an  obituary,  when  he 
might  just  as  well  have  lived  and  written  theirs. 
We  had  a  grand  club  last  Saturday.  Longfel 
low,  Emerson,  Lowell,  Adams,  Tom  Appleton 
(just  home  a  few  weeks  ago),  and  Norton  (who 
has  been  sick  a  good  while)  were  there,  and  lots 
of  others,  and  Lord  Houghton  as  a  guest.  You 
ought  to  have  been  there ;  it  was  the  best  club 
for  a  long  time." 

The  following  note,  written  in  1873,  shows 
how  closely  Dr.  Holmes  kept  the  growth  of  the 
club  in  mind,  and  his  eagerness  to  bring  into  it 
the  distinguished  intellectual  life  of  Boston. 

296  BEACON  STREET,  February  21,  1873. 
MY  DEAR  MR.  FIELDS,  —  I  doubt  whether  I 
shall  feel  well  enough  to  go  to  the  club  to-mor 
row,  as  I  am  somewhat  feverish  and  sore-throaty 
to-day,  though  I  must  crawl  out  to  my  lecture. 


144          OLIVER  WENDELL   HOLMES 

Mr.  Parkman  and  Professor  Wolcott  Gibbs 
are  to  be  voted  for,  you  know. 

President  Eliot,  who  nominated  Professor 
Gibbs,  will,  I  suppose,  -urge  his  claims  if  he 
thinks  it  necessary,  or  see  that  some  one 
does  it. 

As  for  Mr.  Francis  Parkman,  proposed  by 
myself,  I  suppose  his  reputation  is  too  solidly 
fixed  as  a  scholar  and  a  writer  to  need  any  words 
from  me  or  others  of  his  friends  who  may  be 
present. 

He  has  been  a  great  sufferer  from  infirmities 
which  do  not  prevent  him  from  being  very  good 
company,  and  which  I  have  thought  the  good 
company  he  would  find  at  the  Saturday  Club 
would  perhaps  enable  him  to  forget  for  a  while 
more  readily.  It  has  seemed  to  me  so  clear 
that  he  ought  to  belong  to  the  club,  if  he  were 
inclined  to  join  it,  that  I  should  have  nominated 
him  long  ago  had  I  not  labored  under  the  im 
pression  that  he  must  have  been  previously 
proposed.  .  .  . 

Yours  very  truly,      O.  W.  HOLMES. 

For  many  years  it  seemed  that  time  stood 
still  with  the  Autocrat.  His  happy  home 
and  his  cheerful  temper  appeared  to  stay  the 
hand  of  the  destroyer.  At  last  a  long  illness 
fell  upon  his  wife  ;  and  after  her  death,  when 
his  only  daughter,  who  had  gone  to  keep  her 
father's  house,  was  suddenly  taken  from  his 


OLIVER   WENDELL   HOLMES  145 

side,  the  shadows  of  age  gathered  about  him  ; 
then  we  learned  that  he  was  indeed  an  old 
man. 

For  the  few  years  that  remained  to  him  be 
fore  his  summons  came  he  accepted  the  lot  of 
age  with  extraordinary  good  cheer.  His  hear 
ing  became  very  imperfect.  "  I  remind  myself 
sometimes,"  he  said,  "  of  those  verses  I  wrote 
some  years  ago.  I  wonder  if  you  would  re 
member  them  !  I  called  the  poem  '  The  Arch 
bishop  and  Gil  Bias  :  A  Modernized  Version.'  " 
He  then  repeated  with  great  humor  and  pathos 
a  few  of  the  lines  :  — 

44  Can  you  read  as  once  .you  used  to  ?    Well,  the  printing  is 

so  bad, 
No  young  folks'  eyes  can  read  it  like  the  books  that  once 

we  had. 
Are  you  quite  as  quick  of  hearing  ?     Please  to  say  that 

once  again. 
Don't  I  use  plain  words,  your  Reverence  ?    Yes,  I  often 

use  a  cane." 

"As  to  my  sight,"  he  continued,  "I  have 
known  for  some  years  that  I  have  cataracts 
slowly  coming  over  my  eyes  ;  but  they  increase 
so  very  slowly  that  I  often  wonder  which  will 
win  the  race  first  — the  cataracts  or  death." 

He  was  most  carefully  watched  over  during 
the  succeeding  years  of  disability  by  his  dis 
tinguished  son  and  his  daughter-in-law,  of  whose 
talent  he  was  sincerely  proud.  Nevertheless, 
he  suffered  of  necessity  many  lonely  hours,  in 
spite  of  all  that  devotion  could  do  for  him. 


146          OLIVER  WENDELL   HOLMES 

Such  a  wife  and  such  a  loving  daughter  could 
not  pass  from  his  side  and  find  their  places 
filled.  But  he  did  not  "mope,"  as  he  wrote  me 
one  day,  "  I  am  too  busy  for  that ; "  or,  he 
might  have  said  truthfully,  too  well  sustained. 
His  habit  of  carrying  himself  with  an  air  of 
kindliness  toward  all,  and  of  enjoyment  in  the 
opportunities  still  left  him,  was  very  beautiful 
and  unusual.  "  If  the  Lord  thinks  it  best  for 
me  to  stay  until  I  tumble  to  pieces,  I  'm  will 
ing —  I'm  willing,"  he  said.  He  was  always 
capable  of  amusing  his  friends  on  the  subject, 
as  in  the  former  days  when  Old  Age  came 
and  offered  him  "  a  cane,  an  eyeglass,  a  tippet, 
and  a  pair  of  overshoes.  '  No ;  much  obliged 
to  you,'  said  I.  ...  So  I  dressed  myself  up 
in  a  jaunty  way,  and  walked  out  alone ;  got 
a  fall,  caught  a  cold,  was  laid  up  with  lum 
bago,  and  had  time  to  think  over  the  whole 
matter." 

Who  that  heard  him  can  ever  forget  the 
exquisite  reading  of  "The  Last  Leaf"  at  the 
Longfellow  memorial  meeting.  The  pathos  of 
it  was  then  understood  for  the  first  time.  The 
poem  had  become  an  expression  of  his  later 
self,  and  it  was  given  with  a  personal  significance 
which  touched  the  hearts  of  all  his  hearers. 

His  wit  has  left  the  world  sparkling  with  the 
shafts  it  has  let  fly  on  every  side.  They  are 
taken  up  continually  and  sent  out  again  both 
by  those  who  heard  him  utter  them  and  by 


OLIVER  WENDELL  HOLMES          147 

those  who  repeat  them,  unmindful  of  their 
origin. 

His  attention  was  turned  on  some  occasion 
to  a  young  aspirant  for  artistic  fame.  He  re 
ferred  to  the  youthful  person  later  as  "one  who 
performed  a  little  on  the  lead  pencil."  He  said 
to  me  one  day,  "  I  Ve  sometimes  made  new 
words.  In  '  Elsie  Venner'  I  made  the  word 
'chrysocracy,'  thinking  it  would  take  its  place; 
but  it  didn't  :  'plutocracy,'  meaning  the  same 
thing,  was  adopted  instead.  Oddly  enough,  I 
had  a  letter  from  a  man  to-day,  asking  if  I  did 
not  make  the  word  'anaesthesia,'  which  I  cer 
tainly  did." 

In  the  sick-room  he  was  always  a  welcome 
guest.  A  careful  maid  once  asked  if  he  minded 
climbing  two  flights  of  stairs  to  see  his  friend. 
"  I  laughed  when  she  asked  me,"  he  said  ;  "for 
I  shall  have  to  climb  a  good  many  more  than 
that  before  I  see  the  angels." 

"  I  gave  two  dinners  to  two  parties  of  old 
gentlemen  just  before  I  left  town,"  he  said,  the 
year  before  his  death ;  and  then  added,  "  our 
baby  was  seventy-three  !  " 

His  letters  in  the  later  years  were  full  of 
feeling.  He  says  in  one  of  them,  written  on 
a  Christmas  day,  speaking  of  an  old  friend  : 
"  How  many  delightful  hours  the  photographs 
bring  back  to  me  !  ...  Under  his  roof  I  have 
met  more  visitors  to  be  remembered  than  under 
any  other.  But  for  his  hospitality  I  should 


148          OLIVER   WENDELL   HOLMES 

never  have  had  the  privilege  of  personal  ac 
quaintance  with  famous  writers  and  artists 
whom  I  can  now  recall  as  I  saw  them,  talked 
with  them,  heard  them,  in  that  pleasant  library, 
that  most  lively  and  agreeable  dining-room. 
How  could  it  be  otherwise,  with  such  guests 
as  he  entertained,  and  with  his  own  unflagging 
vivacity  and  his  admirable  social  gifts?  Let 
me  live  in  happy  recollections  to-day." 

Only  two  years  before  Dr.  Holmes's  death  he 
said  in  a  letter  received  by  me  in  Italy  :  • "  But 
for  this  troublesome  cold,  which  has  so  much 
better  come  out  than  I  feared,  I  have  been 
doing  well  enough  —  kept  busy  with  letters  and 
dictation  of  my  uneventful  history.  It  is  strange 
how  forgotten  events  and  persons  start  out  of 
the  blank  oblivion  in  which  they  seem  to  have 
been  engulfed,  as  I  fix  my  memory  steadily  on 
the  past.  I  find  it  very  easy,  even  fascinating, 
to  call  up  the  incidents,  trivial  oftentimes,  but 
having  for  me  a  significance  of  their  own,  which 
lie  in  my  past  track  like  the  broken  toys  of 
childhood.  It  seems  as  if  the  past  was  for  each 
of  us  a  great  collection  of  negatives  laid  away, 
from  which  we  can  take  positive  pictures  when 
we  will  —  from  many  of  them,  that  is  ;  for  only 
the  Recording  Angel  can  reproduce  the  pictures 
of  every  instant  of  our  lives  from  these  same 
negatives,  of  which  he  must  have  an  infinite 
collection,  with  which  sooner  or  later  we  are 
liable  to  be  confronted." 


OLIVER  WENDELL   HOLMES  149 

In  another  letter  from  Beverly  Farms,  when 
he  was  eighty-three,  he  says  :  — 

Where  this  will  find  you,  in  a  geographical 
point  of  view,  I  do  not  know ;  but  I  know  your 
heart  will  be  in  its  right  place,  and  accept  kindly 
the  few  barren  words  this  sheet  holds  for  you. 
Yes  ;  barren  of  incident,  of  news  of  all  sorts,  but 
yet  having  a  certain  flavor  of  Boston,  of  Cape 
Ann,  and,  above  all,  of  dear  old  remembrances, 
the  suggestion  of  any  one  of  which  is  as  good 
as  a  page  of  any  common  letter.  So,  whatever 
I  write  will  carry  the  fragrance  of  home  with 
it,  and  pay  you  for  the  three  minutes  it  costs 
you  to  read  it.  .  .  .  I  find  great  delight  in  talk 
ing  over  cathedrals  and  pictures  and  English 
scenery,  and  all  the  sights  my  traveling  friends 
have  been  looking  at,  with  Mrs.  Bell.  It  seems 
to  me  that  she  knew  them  all  beforehand,  so 
that  she  was  journeying  all  the  time  among 
reminiscences  which  were  hardly  distinguish 
able  from  realities. 

My  recollections  are  to  those  of  other  people 
around  me  who  call  themselves  old,  —  the  sex 
agenarians,  for  instance,  —  something  like  what 
a  cellar  is  to  the  ground-floor  of  a  house.  The 
young  people  in  the  upper  stories  (American 
spelling,  story]  go  down  to  the  basement  in 
their  inquiries,  and  think  they  have  got  to  the 
bottom ;  but  I  go  down  another  flight  of  steps, 
and  find  myself  below  the  surface  of  the  earth, 


150          OLIVER   WENDELL   HOLMES 

as  are  the  bodies  of  most  of  my  contempora 
ries.  As  to  health,  I  am  doing  tolerably  well. 
I  have  just  come  in  from  a  moderate  walk  in 
which  I  acquitted  myself  creditably.  I  take 
two-hour  drives  in  the  afternoon,  in  the  open 
or  close  carriage,  according  to  the  weather ; 
but  I  do  not  pretend  to  do  much  visiting,  and 
I  avoid  all  excursions  when  people  go  to  have 
what  they  call  a  "  good  time." 

I  am  reading  right  and  left  —  whatever  turns 
up,,  but  especially  re-reading  old  books.  Two 
new  volumes  of  Dr.  Johnson's  letters  have  fur 
nished  me  part  of  my  reading.  As  for  writing, 
when  my  secretary  —  Miss  Gaudelet  —  comes 
back,  I  shall  resume  my  dictation.  No  literary 
work  ever  seemed  to  me  easier  or  more  agree 
able  than  living  over  my  past  life,  and  putting 
it  on  record  as  well  as  I  could.  If  anybody 
should  ever  care  to  write  a  sketch  or  memoir 
of  my  life,  these  notes  would  help  him  might 
ily.  My  friends  too  might  enjoy  them  —  if  I 
do  not  have  the  misfortune  to  outlive  them  all. 
With  affectionate  regards  and  all  sweet  mes 
sages  to  Miss  Jewett. 

Always  your  friend, 

O.  W.  HOLMES. 

This  letter  gives  a  very  good  picture  of  his 
life  to  the  end.  Few  incidents  occurred  to  break 
the  even  current  of  the  order  he  describes. 
He  still  dined  out  occasionally,  and  I  find  a  few 


OLIVER  WENDELL  HOLMES  151 

reminiscences  of  his  delightful  talk  which  linger 
with  me. 

"  I  've  several  things  bothering  me,"  he  con 
fessed  one  day.  "  First,  I  am  anxious  to  find  a 
suitable  inscription  for  a  child's  porringer.  I 
never  wrote  a  poem  to  a  child,  I  believe.  I 
love  children  dearly ;  I  always  want  to  stop 
them  on  the  street :  but  I  have  never  writ 
ten  about  them ;  nor  have  I  ever  written 
much  about  women.  I  don't  know  why,  but  I 
care  too  much  to  do  the  Tom  Moore  style  of 
thing." 

He  was  eager  to  frame  a  letter  to  President 
Eliot,  and  also  one  to  President  Cleveland,  in 
order  to  advance  some  one  in  need  of  help  ; 
but  the  grasshopper  had, become  a  burden.  "I 
feel  such  things  now  when  I  have  to  do  them," 
he  said ;  "  nevertheless,  when  young  men  and 
maidens  come  skipping  in  with  an  air  of  saying, 
*  Please  give  me  your  autograph,  and  be  quick 
about  it ;  there  may  not  be  much  time  left,'  I 
want  to  say,  '  Take  care,  young  folks  ;  I  may 
be  dancing  over  your  graves  yet ! ' ' 

There  was  a  clock  which  stood  upon  his 
table,  the  bequest  of  Dr.  Henry  J.  Bigelow. 
This  remembrance  from  his  dying  friend  was 
one  of  his  most  valued  possessions.  He  loved 
to  talk  of  Dr.  Bigelow,  and  in  a  published  dis 
course  he  has  said  of  him  :  "He  read  men  and 
women  as  great  scholars  read  books.  He  took 
life  at  first  hand,  and  not  filtered  through  al- 


152          OLIVER  WENDELL  HOLMES 

phabets.  ...  He  would  get  what  he  wanted 
out  of  a  book  as  dexterously  as  a  rodent  will 
get  the  meat  of  a  nut  out  of  its  shell.  ...  He 
handled  his  rapidly  acquired  knowledge  so  like 
an  adept  in  book-lore  that  one  might  have 
thought  he  was  born  in  an  alcove  and  cradled 
on  a  book-shelf."  Dr.  Bigelow  was  so  fre 
quently  in  Dr.  Holmes' s  thought  in  the  latter 
days  that  one  can  hardly  give  a  picture  of  his 
later  life  without  rehearsing  something  of  his 
expression  with  regard  to  him.  He  says  further  : 
"  Dr.  Bigelow  was  unquestionably  a  man  of  true 
genius.  .  .  .  Inexorable  determination  to  have 
the  truth,  if  nature  could  be  forced  to  yield  it, 
characterized  his  powerful  intelligence." 

The  doctor  would  often  look  up  when  the 
little  clock  was  striking  musically  on  his  writ 
ing-table,  and  say,  "  It  always  reminds  me  ten 
derly  of  my  dead  friend." 

When  the  time  came  that  writing  was  a 
burden,  and  indeed,  except  for  limited  periods, 
impossible,  Dr.  Holmes  lived  more  and  more  in 
his  affections.  Often,  as  I  entered  his  room  on 
a  dull  afternoon,  he  would  say,  "  Ah,  now  let 's 
sit  up  by  the  fire  and  talk  of  all  our  friends." 
Then  would  begin  a  series  of  opinions,  witty 
and  tender  by  turns,  and  interspersed  with 
tears  and  smiles.  On  one  such  occasion  he 
said  :  "  There  are  very  few  modern  hymns 
which  have  the  old  ring  of  saintliness  in  them. 
Sometimes  when  I  am  disinclined  to  listen  to 


OLIVER   WENDELL   HOLMES          153 

the  preacher  at  church,  I  turn  to  the  hymn- 
book,  and  when  one  strikes  my  eye,  I  cover 
the  name  at  the  bottom,  and  guess.  It  is  al 
most  invariably  Watts  or  Wesley  ;  after  those, 
there  are  very  few  which  are  good  for  much. 

"  '  Calm  on  the  listening  ear  of  night ' 

is  a  fine  hymn,  but  even  that  lacks  the  virility 
of  the  old  saints." 

Our  minds  that  day  were  full  of  one  thought, 
—  the  death  of  Phillips  Brooks,  —  and  when,  a 
moment  later,  he  said  :  — 

" '  Sweet  fields  beyond  the  swelling  flood ' — 

there  is  nothing  like  that,"  it  seemed  quite 
natural  that  his  voice  should  break  and  the 
tears  come  as  he  added,  without  mentioning 
the  bishop's  name,  "  How  hard  it  is  to  think 
he  is  gone  !  I  don't  like  to  feel  that  I  must  live 
without  him." 

His  days  grew  gradually  shorter,  as  the  days 
of  late  October  dwindle  into  golden  noons. 
During  the  few  hours  when  he  was  at  his  best 
he  was  wonderfully  active,  driving  to  his  pub 
lisher's  or  to  make  an  occasional  visit,  besides 
a  daily  walk.  If  to  those  who  saw  him  contin 
ually  the  circle  of  his  subjects  of  conversation 
began  to  appear  somewhat  circumscribed,  upon 
those  who  met  him  only  occasionally  the  old 
fascination  still  exerted  itself.  He  set  his  door 
wide  open  when  he  made  up  his  mind  to  re 
ceive  and  converse  with  any  human  being. 


154         OLIVER   WENDELL   HOLMES 

There  is  nothing  left  to  say  of  him  which  he 
did  not  cheerfully  and  truthfully  say  of  him 
self.  "  I  am  intensely  interested  in  my  own 
personality,"  he  began  one  day ;  "  but  we  are 
all  interesting  to  ourselves,  or  ought  to  be.  I 
know  I  am,  and  I  see  why.  We  take,  as  it 
were,  a  mold  of  our  own  thought.  Now  let  us 
compare  it  with  the  mold  of  another  man  on 
the  same  subject.  His  mold  is  either  too  large 
or  too  small,  or  the  veins  and  reticulations  are 
altogether  different.  No  one  mold  fits  another 
man's  thought.  It  is  our  own,  and  as  such  has 
especial  interest  and  value." 

It  was  really  amazing  to  see  his  intellectual 
vigor  in  society  even  at  this  late  period.  When 
the  conditions  were  satisfactory,  at  a  small 
luncheon  for  instance,  he  would  soon  grow 
warm  with  excitement,  his  eyes  would  glow, 
and  he  would  talk  with  his  accustomed  fire. 
He  was  like  an  old  war-horse  hearing  the 
trumpet  that  called  to  battle.  His  activity  and 
versatility  of  mind  could  still  distance  many  a 
clever  man  in  the  prime  of  life. 

He  responded  in  the  most  generous  way  to 
the  expectations  of  strangers  and  foreigners 
who  came  to  visit  him  as  if  on  pilgrimage.  He 
always  found  some  entertainment  for  them. 
Sometimes  he  would  read  them  one  of  his 
poems  ;  sometimes  he  would  have  a  pretty  sci 
entific  toy  for  their  amusement ;  or  again  he 
would  write  his  autograph  in  a  volume  of  his 


OLIVER   WENDELL   HOLMES  155 

works  for  them  to  carry  away  in  remembrance. 
Such  guests  could  not  help  feeling  that  they 
had  seen  more  than  the  Dr.  Holmes  of  their 
imagination.  He  entered  into  their  curiosity 
regarding  himself  with  such  charming  sympa 
thy  that  they  came  away  thinking  the  half-hour 
they  had  passed  in  his  study  was  one  always  to 
be  remembered. 

As  I  think  of  those  latest  days,  I  recall  what 
he  himself  wrote  once,  long  ago,  about  old  age  : 
"One  that  remains  walking,"  he  says,  "while 
others  have  dropped  asleep,  and  keeps  a  little 
night-lamp  flame  of  life  burning  year  after  year, 
if  the  lamp  is  not  upset  and  there  is  only  a 
careful  hand  held  round  it  to  prevent  the  puffs 
of  wind  from  blowing  the  flame  out.  That's 
what  I  call  an  old  man." 

"  Now,"  said  the  professor,  "you  don't  mean 
to  tell  me  that  I  have  got  to  that  yet  ?  Why, 
bless  you,  I  am  several  years  short  of  the 
time  !  " 

Dr.  Holmes  left  this  world,  which  he  had 
found  pleasant  and  had  filled  with  pleasantness 
for  others,  after  an  illness  that  was  happily 
brief.  He  passed,  in  the  words  of  that  great 
physician,  Sir  Thomas  Browne,  "  in  drowsy  ap 
proaches  of  sleep ;  .  .  .  believing  with  those 
resolved  Christians  who,  looking  on  the  death 
of  this  world  but  as  a  nativity  of  another,  do 
contentedly  submit  unto  the  common  necessity, 
and  envy  not  Enoch  or  Elias." 


DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE 


DAYS  WITH   MRS.    STOWE 

IN  recalling  Mrs.  Stowe's  life,  with  the  re 
membrance  of  what  she  has  been  to  her  friends, 
to  her  country,  and  to  the  world,  I  am  over 
borne  by  the  sense  of  a  soul  instinct  from  its 
early  consciousness  with  power  working  in  her 
beyond  her  own  thought  or  knowledge  or  will. 
Her  attitude  seemed  by  nature  to  'be  that  of 
contemplation.  Her  heart  was  like  a  burning 
coal  laid  upon  the  altar  of  humanity  ;  and  when 
she  stole  up,  as  it  were,  in  the  night  and  laid  it 
down  for  the  slave  with  tears  and  supplications, 
it  awakened  neither  alarm  nor  wonder  in  her 
spirit  that  in  the  morning  she  saw  a  bright  fire 
burning  there  and  lighting  the  whole  earth. 

Mrs.  Stowe  had  already  passed  through  this 
great  experience  when  I  saw  her  for  the  first 
time  in  Italy.  It  was  only  a  few  weeks  before 
the  war  against  slavery  was  openly  declared, 
and  she  was  like  one  who  having  "  done  all " 
must  now  "  stand."  This  year  indeed  was  one 
of  the  happiest  of  her  life.  She  did  not  yet  see 
the  terrible  feet  of  War  already  close  upon  us, 
yet  she  was  convinced  that  the  end  of  slavery 
was  at  hand.  She  was  released  at  last  from  the 


160  DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE 

toils  which  poverty  had  laid  upon  her  over 
tasked  body.  Her  children  were  with  her,  and 
she  was  enjoying,  as  few  persons  know  how  to 
enjoy,  the  loveliness  of  Italy.  She  delighted, 
too,  in  the  congenial  society  of  Mr.  and  Mrs. 
Browning  and  the  agreeable  friends  who  were 
that  winter  grouped  around  them.  After  her 
long  trial  and  her  years  of  suffering  she  was  to 
have  "  her  day  "  in  the  world  of  beauty  and  love 
which  lay  about  her. 

In  one  of  her  early  letters  to  Georgiana  May, 
in  1833,  she  says,  speaking  of  some  relaxation 
which  had  come  to  her  friend  :  "  How  good  it 
would  be  for  me  to  be  put  into  a  place  which 
so  breaks  up  and  precludes  thought.  Thought, 
intense  emotional  thought,  has  been  my  disease. 
How  much  good  it  might  do  me  to  be  where  I 
could  not  but  be  thoughtless."  This  letter  was 
written  when  she  was  twenty-two  years  old,  and 
there  had  never  been  any  respite  in  her  life 
until  those  sweet  Italian  days  of  the  winter  of 
1859  anc*  '60. 

It  was  only  about  a  year  later  than  the  date 
of  the  above  letter  when  the  subject  of  slavery 
was  first  brought  under  her  own  observation 
during  a  brief  visit  in  Kentucky.  Her  father 
had  received  a  call  in  Boston,  where  he  had 
been  preaching  for  six  years,  to  go  to  Cincin 
nati,  which  at  that  period  was  considered  the 
far  West  and  almost  like  banishment ;  but  the 
call  was  one  not  to  be  refused ;  the  need  of 


DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE  161 

such  preaching  as  Dr.  Beecher's  being  greatly 
felt  at  that  distant  post.  About  a  year  after 
their  arrival  an  invitation  came  to  Harriet  to 
cross  the  river  and  to  see  something  of  Ken 
tucky  in  company  with  a  young  friend.  She 
found  herself  on  the  estate  which  was  later 
known  as  Colonel  Shelby's  in  "  Uncle  Tom's 
Cabin."  Her  companion  said  later,  in  recalling 
their  experience  :  "  Harriet  did  not  seem  to 
notice  anything  in  particular  that  happened,  but 
sat  most  of  the  time  as  though  abstracted  in 
thought.  When  the  negroes  did  funny  things 
and  cut  up  capers,  she  did  not  seem  to  pay  the 
slightest  attention  to  them.  Afterwards,  how 
ever,  in  reading  Uncle  Tom,  I  recognized  scene 
after  scene  of  that  visit  portrayed  with  the 
utmost  fidelity,  and  knew  at  once  where  the 
material  for  that  part  of  the  story  had  been 
gathered." 

To  show  how  completely  her  "style"  was 
herself,  there  is  a  passage  from  one  of  her  early 
letters  describing  her  experience  at  Niagara 
which  burns  with  her  own  fire.  "  Let  me  tell 
you,"  she  says,  "  if  I  can,  what  is  unutterable. 
...  I  did  not  once  think  if  it  were  high  or  low ; 
whether  it  roared  or  did  n't  roar.  .  .  .  My  mind 
whirled  off,  it  seemed  to  me,  in  a  new  strange 
world.  .  .  .  That  rainbow,  breaking  out,  trem 
bling,  fading,  and  again  coming  like  a  beautiful 
spirit  walking  the  waters.  Oh,  it  is  lovelier 
than  it  is  great ;  it  is  like  the  Mind  that  made 


l6a  DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE 

it ;  great,  but  so  veiled  in  beauty  that  we  gaze 
without  terror.  I  felt  as  if  I  could  have  gone 
over  with  the  waters ;  it  would  be  so  beautiful 
a  death  ;  there  would  be  no  fear  in  it.  I  felt 
the  rock  tremble  under  me  with  a  sort  of  joy. 
I  was  so  maddened  I  could  have  gone,  too,  if 
that  had  gone." 

The  first  wife  of  Mr.  Stowe  was  her  most  in 
timate  friend,  and  his  suffering  at  her  death 
moved  her  to  intense  pity,  which  finally  ripened 
into  love.  At  the  last  moment  of  her  maiden 
hood  she  wrote  again  to  Georgiana  May  :  "  In 
about  half  an  hour  more  your  old  friend,  com 
panion,  schoolmate,  sister,  etc.,  will  cease  to  be 
Hatty  Beecher  and  change  to  nobody  knows 
who.  My  dear,  you  are  engaged  and  pledged  in 
a  year  or  two  to  encounter  a  similar  fate,  and 
do  you  wish  to  know  how  you  shall  feel  ?  Well, 
my  dear,  I  have  been  dreading  and  dreading 
the  time,  and  lying  awake  all  last  week  wonder 
ing  how  I  should  live  through  this  overwhelm 
ing  crisis,  and  lo  !  it  has  come  and  I  feel  nothing 
at  all." 

Her  marriage  with  Professor  Stowe  was  a 
congenial  one.  He  discovered  very  early  what 
her  career  must  be  and  wrote  to  her  once  dur 
ing  a  brief  absence  :  "  God  has  written  it  in  his 
book  that  you  must  be  a  literary  woman,  and 
who  are  we  that  we  should  contend  against 
God  ? "  His  admiration  for  her  was  perfect,  a 
feeling  which  she  reciprocated  in  a  somewhat 


DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE  163 

different  form.  "  I  did  not  know,"  she  once 
wrote  to  him,  "until  I  came  away  how  much 
I  was  dependent  upon  you  for  information. 
There  are  a  thousand  favorite  subjects  on 
which  I  could  talk  with  you  better  than  with 
any  one  else.  If  you  were  not  already  my 
dearly  loved  husband,  I  should  certainly  fall  in 
love  with  you." 

She  can  speak  to  him  with  an  openness 
which  she  uses  to  no  one  else  ;  she  says,  and 
in  this  sentence  she  gives  the  secret  of  much 
which  has  appeared  inexplicable  to  the  world : 
"One  thing  more  in  regard  to  myself.  The 
absence  and  wandering  of  mind  and  forgetful- 
ness  that  so  often  vexes  you  is  a  physical  in 
firmity  with  me.  It  is  the  failing  of  a  mind 
not  calculated  to  endure  a  great  pressure  of 
care,  and  so  much  do  I  feel  the  pressure  I  am 
under,  so  much  is  my  mind  darkened  and  trou 
bled  by  care  that  life  seriously  holds  out  few 
allurements,  —  only  my  children."  She  used 
to  say  laughingly  sometimes  in  later  years,  "  My 
brother  Henry  and  I  are  something  like  anacon 
das  :  we  have  our  winter ;  when  we  are  tired 
we  curl  up  and  disappear,  within  ourselves,  as  it 
were ;  nobody  can  get  anything  out  of  us ;  we 
move  about  and  attend  to  our  affairs  and  appear 
like  other  folks  perhaps,  but  we  are  not  there." 

The  trouble  was  that  no  one  could  be  pre 
pared  for  these  vanishings,  not  even  herself. 
Perhaps  a  dinner  company  of  invited  guests 


164  DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE 

were  eagerly  listening  to  her  conversation, 
when  at  some  suggestion  of  a  new  train  of 
ideas,  she  would  suddenly  become  silent  and 
hardly  speak  again.  Occasionally  at  a  recep 
tion  she  would  wander  away,  only  to  be  found 
strolling  about  in  the  conservatory,  if  there 
were  one,  or  quietly  observant  in  some  coign 
of  vantage  where  she  was  not  likely  to  be  dis 
turbed. 

My  first  meeting  with  Mrs.  Stowe  found  her 
in  one  of  her  absent  moods.  We  were  in  Flor 
ence,  and  she  was  delighting  herself  in  the  fas 
cinations  of  that  lovely  city.  Not  alone  every 
day  but  every  second  as  it  passed  was  full  of 
eager  interest  to  her. 

She  could  say  with  Thoreau,  "  I  moments 
live  who  lived  but  years."  We  had  both  been 
invited  to  a  large  reception,  on  a  certain  even 
ing,  in  one  of  the  old  palaces  on  the  Arno. 
There  were  music  and  dancing,  and  there  were 
lively  groups  of  ladies  and  gentlemen  strolling 
from  room  to  room,  contrasting  somewhat 
strangely  in  their  gayety  with  the  solemn  pic 
tures  hanging  on  the  walls,  and  a  sense  of 
shadowy  presence  which  seems  to  haunt  those 
dusky  interiors.  An  odd  discrepancy  between 
the  modern  company  and  the  surroundings,  a 
weird  mingling  of  the  past  and  the  present, 
made  any  apparition  appear  possible,  and  left 
room  only  for  a  faint  thrill  of  surprise  when  a 
voice  by  my  side  said,  "  There  is  Mrs.  Stowe." 


DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE  165 

In  a  moment  she  approached  and  I  was  pre 
sented  to  her,  and  after  a  brief  pause  she 
passed  on.  All  this  was  natural  enough,  but 
a  wave  of  intense  disappointment  swept  over 
me.  Why  had  I  found  no  words  to  express 
or  even  indicate  the  feeling  that  had  choked 
me  ?  Was  the  fault  mine  ?  Oh,  yes,  I  said 
to  myself,  for  I  could  not  conceive  it  to  be 
otherwise,  and  I  looked  upon  my  opportunity, 
the  gift  of  the  gods,  as  utterly  and  forever 
wasted.  I  was  depressed  and  sorrowing  over 
the  vanishing  of  a  presence  I  might  perhaps 
never  meet  again,  and  no  glamour  of  light,  or 
music  or  pictures  or  friendly  voices  could  re 
call  any  pleasure  to  my  heart.  Meanwhile,  the 
unconscious  object  of  all  this  disturbance  was 
strolling  quietly  along,  leaning  on  the  arm  of 
a  friend,  hardly  ever  speaking,  followed  by  a 
group  of  traveling  companions,  and  entirely  ab 
sorbed  in  the  gay  scene  around  her.  She  was 
a  small  woman  ;  and  her  pretty  curling  hair  and 
far-away  dreaming  eyes,  and  her  way  of  becom 
ing  occupied  in  what  interested  her  until  she 
forgot  everything  else  for  the  time,  all  these  I 
first  began  to  see  and  understand  as  I  gazed 
after  her  retreating  figure. 

Mrs.  Stowe's  personal  appearance  has  re 
ceived  scant  justice  and  no  mercy  at  the  hand 
of  the  photographer.  She  says  herself,  during 
her  triumphal  visit  to  England  after  the  publi 
cation  of  "  Uncle  Tom  : "  "  The  general  topic 


i66  DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE 

of  remark  on  meeting  me  seems  to  be  that  I  am 
not  so  bad  looking  as  they  were  afraid  I  was  ; 
and  I  do  assure  you,  when  I  have  seen  the 
things  that  are  put  up  in  the  shop  windows  here 
with  my  name  under  them,  I  have  been  lost  in 
wondering  imagination  at  the  boundless  loving- 
kindness  of  my  English  and  Scottish  friends  in 
keeping  up  such  a  warm  heart  for  such  a  Gor 
gon.  I  should  think  that  the  Sphinx  in  the 
London  Museum  might  have  sat  for  most  of 
them.  I  am  going  to  make  a  collection  of  -these 
portraits  to  bring  home  to  you.  There  is  a 
great  variety  of  them,  and  they  will  be  useful, 
like  the  Irishman's  guideboard  which  showed 
'  where  the  road  did  not  go.'  "  I  remember 
once  accompanying  her  to  a  reception  at  a  well- 
known  house  in  Boston,  where,  before  the  even 
ing  was  over,  the  hostess  drew  me  aside,  saying, 
"  Why  did  you  never  tell  me  that  Mrs.  Stowe 
was  beautiful  ?  "  And  indeed,  when  I  observed 
her  in  the  full  ardor  of  conversation,  with  her 
heightened  color,  her  eyes  shining  and  awake, 
but  rilled  with  great  softness,  her  abundant 
curling  hair  rippling  naturally  about  her  head 
and  falling  a  little  at  the  sides  (as  in  the  por 
trait  by  Richmond),  I  quite  agreed  with  the 
lady  of  the  house.  Nor  was  that  the  first  time 
her  beauty  had  been  revealed  to  me,  but  she 
was  seldom  seen  to  be  beautiful  by  the  great 
world,  and  the  pleasure  of  this  recognition  was 
very  great  to  those  who  loved  her. 


DAYS   WITH   MRS.  STOWE  167 

She  was  never  afflicted  with  a  personal  con 
sciousness  of  her  reputation,  nor  was  she  tram 
meled  by  it.  The  sense  that  a  great  work 
had  been  accomplished  through  her  only  made 
her  more  humble,  and  her  shy,  absent-minded 
ways  were  continually  throwing  her  admirers 
into  confusion.  Late  in  life  (when  her  failing 
powers  made  it  impossible  for  her  to  speak  as 
one  living  in  a  world  which  she  seemed  to  have 
left  far  behind)  she  was  accosted,  I  was  told,  in 
the  garden  of  her  country  retreat,  in  the  twi 
light  one  evening,  by  a  good  old  retired  sea 
captain  who  was  her  neighbor  for  the  time. 
"When  I  was  younger,"  said  he  respectfully, 
holding  his  hat  in  his  hand  while  he  spoke, 
"I  read  with  a  great  deal  of  satisfaction  and 
instruction  *  Uncle  Tom's  Cabin.'  The  story  im 
pressed  me  very  much,  and  I  am  happy  to  shake 
hands  with  you,  Mrs.  Stowe,  who  wrote  it."  "  I 
did  not  write  it,"  answered  the  white-haired  old 
lady  gently,  as  she  shook  the  captain's  hand. 
"You  didn't?"  he  ejaculated  in  amazement. 
"  Why,  who  did,  then  ?  "  "  God  wrote  it,"  she 
replied  simply.  "  I  merely  did  his  dictation." 
"Amen,"  said  the  captain  reverently,  as  he 
walked  thoughtfully  away. 

This  was  the  expression  in  age  of  what  lay  at 
the  foundation  of  her  life.  She  always  spoke 
and  behaved  as  if  she  recognized  herself  to  be 
an  instrument  breathed  upon  by  the  Divine 
Spirit.  When  we  consider  how  this  idea  ab- 


i68  DAYS   WITH    MRS.   STOWE 

sorbed  her  to  the  prejudice  of  what  appeared  to 
I  others  a  wholesome  exercise  of  human  will  and 
judgment,  it  is  not  wonderful  that  the  world 
was  offended  when  she  once  made  conclusions 
contrary  to  the  opinion  of  the  public,  and 
thought  best  to  publish  them. 

Mrs.  Stowe  was  a  delightful  talker.  She 
loved  to  gather  a  small  circle  of  friends  around 
a  fireside,  when  she  easily  took  the  lead  in  fun 
and  story  telling.  This  was  her  own  ground, 
and  upon  it  she  was  not  to  be  outdone.  •"  Let 
me  put  my  feet  upon  the  fender,"  she  would 
say,  "and  I  can  talk  till  all  is  blue." 

It  appeared  to  those  who  listened  most  fre 
quently  to  her  conversation  that  a  large  part  of 
the  charm  of  her  tales  was  often  lost  in  the 
writing  down ;  yet  with  all  her  unusual  powers 
she  was  an  excellent  listener  herself.  Her 
natural  modesty  was  such  that  she  took  keen 
pleasure  in  gathering  fresh  thought  and  inspira 
tion  from  the  conversation  of  others.  Nor  did 
the  universal  homage  she  received  from  high 
and  low  leave  any  unworthy  impression  upon  her 
self-esteem.  She  was  grateful  and  pleased  and 
humble,  and  the  only  visible  effect  produced 
upon  her  was  the  heightened  pleasure  she  re 
ceived  from  the  opportunities  of  knowing  men 
and  women  who  excited  her  love  and  admira 
tion.  Her  name  was  a  kind  of  sacred  talis- 
f  i  man,  especially  in  New  and  Old  England.  It 
was  a  banner  which  had  led  men  to  battle 


DAYS    WITH    MRS.   STOWE  169 

against  slavery.  Therefore  it  was  often  a  cause 
of  surprise  and  social  embarrassment  when  the 
bearer  of  this  name  proved  to  be  sometimes  too 
modest,  and  sometimes  too  absent-minded,  to 
remember  that  anything  was  expected  of  her 
or  anything  arranged  for  her  special  entertain 
ment. 

She  was  utterly  taken  by  surprise  once  in  a 
foreign  city  by  being  invited  out  to  breakfast, 
as  she  supposed  privately,  and  finding  herself 
suddenly  in  a  large  hall,  upon  a  raised  plat 
form  crowded  with  local  dignitaries,  and  greeted 
before  she  could  get  her  breath  by  a  chorus 
of  children's  voices  singing  an  anthem  in  her 
honor,  especially  composed  for  the  occasion. 
Her  love  of  fun  was  greatly  excited  by  this  un 
expected  situation,  and  she  used  to  relate  the 
anecdote,  with  details  about  her  unprepared 
condition  which  were  irresistibly  amusing.  In 
a  letter  home  she  refers  incidentally  to  the 
large  breakfast  party  and  says  :  "I  could  not 
help  wondering  if  old  mother  Scotland  had  put 
into  'the  father  of  all  the  tea-kettles'  two 
thousand  teaspoonfuls  of  tea  for  the  company 
and  one  for  the  teapot,  as  is  our  good  Yankee 
custom." 

The  tributes  paid  to  her  were  ceaseless,  and 
her  house  in  Hartford  testifies  to  many  of 
them.  "There,"  as  her  friend  and  neighbor 
the  Reverend  Joseph  Twichell  wrote  once  in 
a  brief  sketch  of  her  —  a  sketch  full  of  deep 


i;o  DAYS   WITH    MRS.   STOWE 

feeling  —  "  there,  an  observant  stranger  would 
soon  discover  whose  house  he  was  in,  and  be 
reminded  of  the  world -wide  distinction  her 
genius  has  won  and  of  that  great  service  of 
humanity  with  which  her  name  is  forever  iden 
tified.  He  would,  for  instance,  remark  on  its 
pedestal  in  the  bow-window  a  beautiful  bronze 
statuette  by  Cumberworth  called  '  The  African 
Woman  of  the  Fountain,'  and  on  an  easel  in 
the  back  parlor  a  lovely  engraving  of  the  late 
Duchess  of  Sutherland  and  her  daughter  —  a 
gift  from  her  son,  the  present  Duke  of  that 
name,  subscribed  '  Mrs.  Stowe,  with  the  Duke 
of  Sutherland's  kind  regards,  1869.'  Should 
he  look  into  a  low  oaken  case  standing  in  the 
hall,  he  would  find  there  the  twenty-six  folio 
volumes  of  the  '  Affectionate  and  Christian  Ad 
dress  of  Many  Thousands  of  Women  in  Great 
Britain  and  Ireland  to  their  Sisters  in  the 
United  States  of  America '  pleading  the  cause 
of  the  slave,  and  signed  with  over  half  a  million 
names,  which  was  delivered  to  Mrs.  Stowe  in  per 
son  at  a  notable  gathering  at  Stafford  House,  in 
England,  in  1853  ;  and  with  it  similar  addresses 
from  the  citizens  of  Leeds,  of  Glasgow,  and 
Edinburgh,  presented  at  about  the  same  time. 
The  house,  indeed,  is  a  treasury  of  such  relics, 
testimonials  of  reverence  and  regard,  trophies 
of  renown  from  many  lands,  enough  to  fur 
nish  a  museum,  all  of  the  highest  historic  in 
terest  and  value.  .  .  .  There  are  relics,  too,  of 


DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE  171 

more  private  sort ;  for  example,  a  smooth  stone 
of  two  or  three  pounds  weight,  and  a  sketch  or 
study  of  it  by  Ruskin  made  at  a  hotel  on  Lake 
Neuchatel,  where  he  and  Mrs.  Stowe  chanced 
to  meet.  .  .  .  One  of  her  most  prized  posses 
sions  is  a  gold  chain  of  ten  links,  which,  on  oc 
casion  of  the  gathering  at  Stafford  House  that 
•  has  been  referred  to,  the  Duchess  of  Suther 
land  took  from  her  own  arm  and  clasped  upon 
Mrs.  Stowe' s,  saying,  *  This  is  the  memorial  of 
a  chain  which  we  trust  will  soon  be  broken.' 
On  several  of  the  ten  links  were  engraved  the 
great  dates  in  the  annals  of  emancipation  in 
England ;  and  the  hope  was  expressed  that  she 
would  live  to  add  to  them  other  dates  of  like 
import  in  the  progress  of  liberty  this  side  the 
Atlantic.  That  was  in  1853.  Twelve  years 
later  every  link  had  its  inscription,  and  the 
record  was  complete." 

It  was  my  good  fortune  to  be  in  Mrs.  Stowe's 
company  once  in  Rome  when  she  came  unex 
pectedly  face  to  face  with  an  exhibition  of  the 
general  feeling  of  reverence  and  gratitude  toj 
wards  herself.  We  had  gone  together  to  the 
rooms  of  the  brothers  Castellani,  the  world; 
famous  workers  in  gold.  The  collection  of  an 
tique  gems  and  the  beautiful  reproductions  of 
them  were  new  to  us.  Mrs.  Stowe  was  full  of  en 
thusiasm,  and  we  lingered  long  over  the  wonder 
ful  things  which  the  brothers  brought  forward 
to  show.  Among  them  was  the  head  of  an  Egyp- 


172  DAYS   WITH    MRS.   STOWE 

tian  slave  carved  in  black  onyx.  It  was  an  ad 
mirable  work  of  art,  and  while  we  were  enjoying 
it  one  of  them  said  to  Mrs.  Stowe,  "  Madam,  we 
know  what  you  have  been  to  the  poor  slave.  We 
ourselves  are  but  poor  slaves  still  in  Italy  :  you 
feel  for  us  ;  will  you  keep  this  gem  as  a  slight 
recognition  of  what  you  have  done  ? "  She 
took  the  jewel  in  silence ;  but  when  we  looked 
for  some  response,  her  eyes  were  filled  with 
tears,  and  it  was  impossible  for  her  to  speak. 

This  feeling  often  found  less  refined  mani 
festation.  One  day  when  she  was  shopping  in 
Boston,  after  making  her  purchase  she  gave  her 
name  in  a  low  but  distinct  voice  to  the  clerk 
who  was  to  send  the  goods.  "  Dear  me,"  said 
a  lively  woman,  audibly  by  my  side,  "  I  should 
be  ashamed  to  give  that  name  ;  I  should  as 
soon  think  of  giving  Angel  Gabriel !  "  Of 
course  we  were  all  greatly  amused  by  this  sally, 
but  Mrs.  Stowe  smiled  quietly  according  to  her 
wont  and  passed  on. 

Great  human  tenderness  was  one  of  her  chief 
characteristics.  Although  she  was  a  reformer 
by  nature  there  was  no  sternness  in  her  com 
position.  Forgetfulness  of  others  there  was 
certainly  sometimes,  arising  from  her  hopeless 
absent-mindedness  and  the  preoccupation  con 
sequent  upon  her  work  ;  but  her  whole  life  was 
swayed  and  ruled  by  her  affections. 

Her  love  was  a  sheet  anchor  which  held  in 
the  stormiest  seas.  Of  her  household  devotion 


DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE  173 

it  is  impossible  to  speak  fitly;  but  there  are 
few  natures  that  can  be  said  to  have  been  more 
dependent  upon  human  love.  Her  tender  ways 
were  inexpressibly  touching. 

Early  in  life  she  had  written  to  her  brother 
while  hardly  more  than  a  girl :  "  I  wish  I  could 
bring  myself  to  feel  perfectly  indifferent  to  the 
opinions  of  others.  I  believe  there  never  was 
a  person  more  dependent  on  the  good  and  evil 
opinions  of  those  around  than  I  am.  This  de 
sire  to  be  loved  forms,  I  fear,  the  great  motive 
for  all  my  actions." 

Such  a  nature  was  quite  unlikely  to  play  the 
part  of  a  famous  woman  of  the  world  with  any 
success,  and  she  did  not  attempt  it.  She  was 
always  reaching  out  to  the  friends  of  her  adop 
tion  and  drawing  them  closer  to  her  side. 

In  those  days  of  our  early  acquaintance  in 
Italy  we  had  ample  opportunity  to  discover  the 
affectionate  qualities  of  her  character.  If  my 
first  interview  was  a  disappointment,  her  second 
greeting  a  few  days  later  had  the  warmth  of 
old  acquaintance.  From  that  moment  we  (my 
husband  and  I)  were  continually  meeting  her, 
in  galleries  and  out  of  them  ;  at  Bellosguardo, 
which  Hawthorne  had  just  quitted,  but  where 
Isa  Blagden  and  Frances  Power  Cobbe  still 
lingered,  or  in  Florence  itself  with  Francesca 
Alexander  and  her  family ;  at  the  Trollopes',  or 
elsewhere,  while  our  evenings  were  commonly 
spent  in  each  other's  apartments. 


174  DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE 

As  the  hours  of  our  European  play-days 
drew  near  the  end,  she  began  to  lay  plans  for 
returning  home  in  the  steamer  with  those  who 
had  grown  dear  to  her,  and  in  one  of  her  notes 
of  that  period  she  wrote  to  me  :  — 

"  On  the  strength  of  having  heard  that  you 
were  going  home  in  the  Europa  June  i6th,  we 
also  have  engaged  passage  therein  for  that  time, 
and  hope  that  we  shall  not  be  disappointed.  .  .  . 
It  must  be  true,  we  can't  have  it  otherwise. 
.  .  .  Our  Southern  Italy  trip  was  a  glory —  it 
was  a  rose  —  a  nightingale  —  all,  in  short,  that 
one  ever  dreams;  but  alas  !  it  is  over." 

It  was  a  delightful  voyage  homeward  in  every 
sense.  At  that  period  a  voyage  was  no  little  mat 
ter  of  six  days,  but  a  good  fourteen  days  of  sitting 
together  on  deck  in  pleasant  summer  weather, 
and  having  time  enough  and  to  spare.  Haw 
thorne  and  his  family  also  concluded  to  join  the 
party.  Mrs.  Hawthorne,  who  was  always  the 
romancer  in  conversation,  filled  the  evening 
hours  by  weaving  magic  webs  of  her  fancies, 
until  we  looked  upon  her  as  a  second  Schehera 
zade,  and  the  day  the  head  was  to  be  cut  off 
was  the  day  we  should  come  to  shore.  "Oh," 
said  Hawthorne,  "  I  wish  we  might  never  get 
there."  But  the  good  ship  moved  steadily  as 
fate.  Meanwhile,  Mrs.  Stowe  often  took  her 
turn  at  entertaining  the  little  group.  She  was 
seldom  tired  of  relating  stories  of  New  England 
life  and  her  early  experiences. 


DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE  175 

When  the  ship  came  to  shore,  Mrs.  Stowe 
and  her  daughters  went  at  once  to  Andover, 
where  Professor  Stowe  had  remained  at  his  post 
during  their  long  absence  in  Europe.  She  went 
also  with  equal  directness  to  her  writing-desk ; 
and  though  there  are  seldom  any  dates  upon 
her  letters,  the  following  note  must  have  been 
written  shortly  after  her  return  :  — 

MY  DEAR  MR.  FIELDS,  —  "Agnes  of  Sor 
rento  "  was  conceived  on  the  spot,  —  a  sponta 
neous  tribute  to  the  exceeding  loveliness  and 
beauty  of  all  things  there. 

One  bright  evening,  as  I  was  entering  the 
old  gateway,  I  saw  a  beautiful  young  girl  sit 
ting  in  its  shadow  selling  oranges.  She  was  my 
Agnes.  Walking  that  same  evening  through 
the  sombre  depths  of  the  gorge,  I  met  "Old 
Elsie,"  walking  erect  and  tall,  with  her  piercing 
black  eyes,  Roman  nose,  and  silver  hair,  — 
walking  with  determination  in  every  step,  and 
spinning  like  one  of  the  Fates  glittering  silver 
flax  from  a  distaff  she  carried  in  her  hands. 

A  few  days  after,  our  party,  being  weather 
bound  at  Salerno,  had  resort  to  all  our  talents  to 
pass  the  time,  and  songs  and  stories  were  the 
fashion  of  the  day.  The  first  chapter  was  my 
contribution  to  that  entertainment.  The  story 
was  voted  into  existence  by  the  voices  of  all 
that  party,  and  by  none  more  enthusiastically 
than  by  one  young  voice  which  will  never  be 


i;6  DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE 

heard  on  earth  more.  It  was  kept  in  mind  and 
expanded  and  narrated  as  we  went  on  to  Rome 
over  a  track  that  the  pilgrim  Agnes  is  to  travel. 
To  me,  therefore,  it  is  fragrant  with  love  of  Italy 
and  memory  of  some  of  the  brightest  hours  of 
life. 

I  wanted  to  write  something  of  this  kind  as 
an  author's  introduction  to  the  public.  Could 
you  contrive  to  print  it  on  a  fly-leaf,  if  I  get  it 
ready,  and  put  a  little  sort  of  dedicatory  poem 
at  the  end  of  it  ?  I  shall  do  this  at  least  in-  the 
book,  if  not  now. 

A  network  of  difficulties  seems  to  have 
closed  about  her  at  this  time,  because  in  spite 
of  her  interest  in  the  new  story  and  the  hopeful 
view  which  she  took  of  its  speedy  completion, 
several  months  passed  by  before  anything  defi 
nite  came  respecting  her  literary  plans. 

Meanwhile  she  had  been  tempted  into  begin 
ning  a  story  for  "  The  Independent,"  which 
proved  to  be  "  The  Pearl  of  Orr's  Island,"  a 
story  good  enough,  if  she  had  been  left  to  her 
self  and  not  overridden  by  greedy  editors  and 
publishers,  to  have  added  a  lustre  even  to  her 
name.  It  is  to  this  she  refers  in  the  following 
letter  when  she  speaks  of  her  "  Maine  story." 
Unhappily  this  first  number  drew  off  power 
which  belonged  to  "Agnes  of  Sorrento,"  and 
Agnes  served  to  prevent  her  from  ending  "The 
Pearl  of  Orr's  Island  "  in  a  manner  worthy  of 
its  first  promise. 


DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE  177 

She  says,  writing  in  January,  1861,  "Authors 
are  apt,  I  suppose,  like  parents,  to  have  their 
unreasonable  partialities.  Everybody  has,  — 
and  I  have  a  pleasure  in  writing  'Agnes  of 
Sorrento  '  that  gilds  this  icy  winter  weather.  I 
write  my  Maine  story  with  a  shiver,  and  come 
back  to  this  as  to  a  flowery  home  where  I  love 
to  rest. 

"  My  manuscripts  are  always  left  to  the  print 
ers  for  punctuation,  —  as  you  will  observe,  — 
I  have  no  time  for  copying." 

Mrs.  Stowe's  health  was  not  vigorous  at  this 
period.  Incessant  drafts  upon  her  energy  had 
enfeebled  her ;  but  her  spirit  was  indomitable, 
and  when  she  was  weary  a  brief  visit  to  Boston 
was,  she  considered,  sufficient  to  restore  her 
nervous  force.  During  these  visits  she  some 
times  rehearsed  the  story  of  the  early  days  of 
her  married  life,  when  she  fought  her  way 
through  difficulties  and  under  the  burden  of  sor 
rows  which  would  have  crushed  many  another 
woman. 

The  tale  of  the  arrival  of  the  family  on  a  win 
try  day  in  Brunswick,  Me.,  where  her  husband 
had  been  appointed  to  a  professorship  in  Bow- 
doin  College,  of  the  dreary  season,  the  bitter 
cold,  the  unopened  door  of  an  empty  house, 
their  future  home,  left  a  vivid  impression  upon 
the  minds  of  her  listeners ;  not  because  of  its 
forlornness,  but  because  of  the  splendid  energy 
and  patience  which  she  brought  to  the  occasion 


i;8  DAYS   WITH   MRS.  STOWE 

and  the  light  she  was  able  to  cast  over  the  grim- 
ness  of  circumstance.  Of  £ourse,  at  the  date  in 
which  this  is  written,  it  is  difficult  to  conceive 
anything  like  grimness  as  associated  with  the 
comfortable  and  social  town  of  Brunswick,  but  we 
must  not  fail  to  remember  how  rapid  the  growth 
of  winter  comfort  has  been  throughout  New  Eng 
land.  This  house  in  the  village  of  Brunswick 
was  the  birthplace  of  "Uncle  Tom's  Cabin;" 
but  long  before  her  pen  could  be  allowed  to 
touch  the  paper  the  door  of  the  house  must 
be  unlocked,  the  fire  made,  and  her  little  chil 
dren  warmed  and  fed.  The  walls  too  must  be 
freshly  papered  and  painted  with  her  own  unas 
sisted  hands,  and  a  long  table  spread  which 
could  serve  as  a  family  dining-table  and  her 
own  and  only  place  for  writing.  Here,  as  Mr. 
Fields  once  said  in  one  of  his  lectures,  "  A  New 
England  woman  once  wrote  a  great  novel  while 
beset  with  difficulties,  pinched  by  poverty,  and 
surrounded  by  hard  work  from  sunrise  to  mid 
night,  year  in  and  year  out.  She  was  a  pal 
lid,  earnest,  tired  little  body,  who  sat  in  her 
white  cottage  down  in  Brunswick  in  the  state 
of  Maine.  She  had  been  busy  all  day,  perhaps 
painting  a  room,  for  her  means  would  not  allow 
her  to  hire  it  done.  Besides  that  labor  she 
cooked  for  the  family,  and  had  done  all  her 
other  household  duties,  without  assistance,  and 
without  flinching  or  groaning.  The  children 
were  hushed  to  sleep;  all  was  still  about  the 


DAYS  WITH   MRS.   STOWE  179 

house,  and  she  trimmed  the  solitary  lamp  for 
a  long  session  at  her  writing-table. 

"  Thus  she  sat  many  a  night  and  wrote,  and 
wept,  and  wrote  again,  until  she  had  poured  out 
her  soul  before  the  Lord  for  humanity's  sake. 
And  then  came,  a  little  slowly  at  first,  but  roll 
ing  surely  with  an  awful  sound,  that  great  uni 
versal  response  ;  the  voice  of  the  people  of  the 
whole  earth  speaking  as  one." 

The  labor,  the  shock,  were  past,  but  the 
fatigue  and  the  strain  of  the  long  struggle  for 
freedom  which  she  carried  always  on  her  own 
heart  could  never  be  over-lived.  She  was  al 
ready,  as  Mrs.  Hawthorne  used  to  say,  "tired 
far  into  the  future."  The  woman  who  had 
written  "  Uncle  Tom  "  was  not  to  continue  a 
series  of  equally  exciting  stories,  but  she  was 
to  bear  the  burden  and  heat  of  much  every 
day  labor  with  the  patience  and  the  rejoicing  of 
all  faithful  souls. 

We  are  reminded,  as  we  study  Mrs.  Stowe's 
life,  of  Swinburne's  noble  tribute  to  Sir  Walter 
Scott  after  reading  his  Journals  which  appeared 
in  full  only  five  or  six  years  ago.  He  says  : 
"  Now  that  we  have  before  us  in  full  —  in  all 
reasonable  or  desired  completeness  —  the  great 
man's  own  record  of  his  troubles,  his  emotions, 
and  his  toils,  we  find  it,  from  the  opening  to 
the  close,  a  record,  not  only  of  dauntless  en 
durance,  but  of  elastic  and  joyous  heroism.  ... 
It  is  no  longer  pity  that  any  one  may  presume 


i8o  DAYS   WITH    MRS.   STOWE 

to  feel  for  him  at  the  lowest  ebb  of  his  fortunes 
or  his  life ;  it  is  rapture  of  sympathy,  admira 
tion,  and  applause.  'This  was  a  man.' ' 

The  war,  the  enlistment  of  her  second  son, 
the  eldest  having  already  died,  filled  her  heart 
and  mind  afresh  with  new  problems  and  anxie 
ties.  She  wrote  the  following  hurried  note  from 
Hartford  in  1862,  which  gives  some  idea  of  her 
occupations  and  frame  of  mind :  "  I  am  going 
to  Washington  to  see  the  heads  of  departments 
myself,  and  to  satisfy  myself  that  I  may  "refer 
to  the  Emancipation  Proclamation  as  a  reality 
and  a  substance,  not  a  fizzle  out  at  the  little 
end  of  the  horn,  as  I  should  be  sorry  to  call 
the  attention  of  my  sisters  in  Europe  to  any 
such  impotent  conclusion.  ...  I  mean  to  have 
a  talk  with  '  Father  Abraham  '  himself,  among 
others." 

Mrs.  Stowe  lost  no  time,  but  proceeded  to 
carry  out  her  plan  as  soon  as  practicable.  Of 
this  visit  to  Washington  she  says  little  in  her 
letters  beyond  the  following  meagre  words :  "  It 
seems  to  be  the  opinion  here,  not  only  that  the 
President  will  stand  up  to  his  proclamation,  but 
that  the  Border  States  will  accede  to  his  pro 
position  for  emancipation.  I  have  noted  the 
thing  as  a  glorious  expectancy  !  .  .  .  To-day  to 
the  home  of  the  contrabands,  seeing  about  five 
hundred  poor  fugitives  eating  a  comfortable 
Thanksgiving  dinner,  and  singing,  '  Oh,  let  my 
people  go ! '  It  was  a  strange  and  moving 
sight." 


DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE  181 

It  was  left  for  others  to  speak  of  her  inter 
view  with  President  Lincoln.  Her  daughter 
was  told  that  when  the  President  heard  her 
name  he  seized  her  hand,  saying,  "  Is  this  the 
little  woman  who  made  this  great  war  ?  "  He 
then  led  her  apart  to  a  seat  in  the  window, 
where  they  were  withdrawn  from  other  guests, 
and  undisturbed.  No  one  but  those  two  souls 
will  ever  know  what  waves  of  thought  and  feel 
ing  swept  over  them  in  that  brief  hour. 

Afterwards  she  heard  these  words  pronounced 
in  the  Senate  Chamber  in  the  Message  of  Presi 
dent  Lincoln  ;  it  was  in  the  darkest  hour  of  the 
war,  Mrs.  Stowe  wrote,  when  defeat  and  dis 
couragement  had  followed  the  Union  armies 
and  all  hearts  were  trembling  with  fear :  "  If 
this  struggle  is  to  be  prolonged  till  there  be 
not  a  home  in  the  land  where  there  is  not  one 
dead,  till  all  the  treasure  amassed  by  the  unpaid 
labor  of  the  slave  shall  be  wasted,  till  every 
drop  of  blood  drawn  by  the  lash  shall  be  atoned 
by  blood  drawn  by  the  sword,  we  can  only  bow 
and  say,  'Just  and  true  are  thy  ways,  thou 
King  of  saints  '  !  " 

During  her  Boston  visits  Mrs.  Stowe  was 
always  interested  to  observe  the  benevolent 
work  going  on  about  her  and  to  lend  a  hand  if 
it  were  possible.  One  incident  flavored  with  a 
strong  touch  of  the  ludicrous  still  lingers  in  my 
memory.  We  had  fallen  in  somewhere  with  a 
poor  little  waif  of  a  boy,  one  easily  to  be  recog- 


182  DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE 

nized  by  the  practiced  eye  of  to-day  as  a  good 
specimen  of  the  street  Arab.  This  little  being 
was  taken  up  by  us  and  brought  home.  His 
arrival  was  looked  upon  with  horror  by  the  ser 
vants,  who  recognized  existing  facts  and  foresaw 
future  miseries  veiled  from  our  less  educated 
vision.  A  visit  to  the  bathroom  was  at  once 
suggested;  but  as  none  of  the  house  maidens 
offered  to  take  charge  of  the  business,  Mrs. 
Stowe  announced  herself  as  more  than  equal 
to  the  occasion,  and  proceeded  to  administer 
the  first  bath  probably  ever  known  to  that 
specimen  of  the  human  family.  Hawthorne's 
clasping  the  leprous  child  was  but  a  shadow 
compared  to  that  hour,  but  happily  Mrs.  Stowe 
was  not  Hawthorne  and  she  combed  and 
scrubbed  faithfully. 

I  cannot  recall  the  precise  ending  of  the  tale. 
I  can  only  remember  the  whole  house  being 
aroused  at  some  unearthly  hour  of  that  night 
by  the  child's  outcries,  from  his  unusual  indul 
gence  in  a  good  supper,  and  Mrs.  Stowe' s 
amusement  at  the  situation.  She  declared  the 
household  was  far  better  constituted  to  look 
after  young  cherubim  than  young  male  humans. 
Something  of  the  canary-bird  order  would  be 
much  more  in  its  line,  she  said.  I  believe  he 
ran  away  the  next  day,  probably  understanding 
the  fitness  of  things  better  than  ourselves.  At 
any  rate  I  find  a  comforting  note  on  the  sub 
ject  from  Andover  saying:  "If  we  can  do  no 


DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE  183 

more  we  must  let  him  go.  He  certainly  stands 
a  better  chance  in  his  life's  journey  for  the  little 
good  we  have  been  able  to  put  into  him.  When 
we  try  a  little  to  resist  the  evil  current  and  to 
pull  here  and  there  one  out,  we  learn  how  dread 
ful  is  the  downward  gravitation,  the  sweep  and 
whirl  of  the  maelstrom.  Let  us  hope  all  these 
have  a  Father, -who  charges  himself  with  them 
somewhere  further  on  in  their  eternal  pilgrim 
age  when  our  weak  hold  fails." 

In  the  autumn  of  1862  a  plan  for  leaving 
Andover  altogether  was  finally  matured.  She 
wrote,  "  You  have  heard  that  we  are  going  to 
Hartford  to  live,  and  I  am  now  in  all  the  bustle 
of  house  planning,  to  say  nothing  of  grading, 
under-draining,  and  setting  out  trees  around 
our  future  home.  It  is  four  acres  and  a  half 
of  lovely  woodland  on  the  banks  of  a  river  and 
yet  within  an  easy  walk  of  Hartford  ;  in  fact, 
in  the  city  limits  ;  and  when  our  house  is  done 
you  and  yours  must  come  and  see  us.  I  would 
rather  have  made  the  change  in  less  troublous 
times,  but  the  duties  here  draw  so  hardly  on 
Mr.  Stowe's  strength  that  I  thought  it  better 
to  live  on  less  and  be  in  a  place  of  our  own,  and 
with  no  responsibilities  except  those  of  common 
gentlefolk." 

Mrs.  Stowe's  love  of  home,  of  the  fireside, 
and  her  faith  in  family  ties  were  marked  charac 
teristics  of  her  nature.  For  the  first  time  in  her 
life  she  was  now  to  make  the  material  house  at 


1 84  DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE 

least  after  her  own  idea,  and  for  many  months 
she  was  entirely  absorbed  in  the  enjoyment  of 
forming  plans  for  her  Hartford  home. 

In  November,  1862,  she  was  in  Hartford 
superintending  the  growing  establishment.  She 
wrote :  "  My  house  with  eight  gables  is  grow 
ing  wonderfully.  I  go  over  every  day  to  see  it. 
I  am  busy  with  drains,  sewers,  sinks,  digging, 
trenching,  and  above  all  with  manure !  You 
should  see  the  joy  with  which  I  gaze  on  manure 
heaps  in  which  the  eye  of  faith  sees  Delaware 
grapes  and  D'Angouleme  pears,  and  all  sorts  of 
roses  and  posies,  all  which  at  some  future  day  I 
hope  you  will  be  able  to  enjoy. 

"  Do  tell  me  if  our  friend  Hawthorne  praises 
that  arch-traitor  Pierce  in  his  preface  and  your 
loyal  firm  publishes  it.  I  never  read  the  pre 
face,  and  have  not  yet  seen  the  book,  but  they 
say  so  here,  and  I  can  scarcely  believe  it  of  you, 
if  I  can  of  him.  I  regret  that  I  went  to  see  him 
last  summer.  What !  patronize  such  a  traitor 
to  our  faces  !  I  can  scarce  believe  it." 

In  the  month  of  May,  1863,  came  her  first 
letter  from  the  new  place.  Already  we  find 
that  the  ever-present  need  has  driven  her  on  to 
print  her  thoughts  about  "  House  and  Home." 

HARTFORD,  OAKWOLD,  May  ist. 
MY  DEAR  FRIEND,  —  I  came  here  a  month 
ago  to  hurry  on  the  preparations  for  our  house, 
in  which  I  am  now  writing,  in  the  high  bow 


DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE  185 

window  of  Mr.  Stowe's  study,  overlooking  the 
wood  and  river.  We  are  not  moved  in  yet,  only 
our  things,  and  the  house  presents  a  scene  of 
the  wildest  chaos,  the  furniture  having  been 
tumbled  in  and  lying  boxed  and  promiscuous. 

I  sent  the  sixth  number  of  "House  and 
Home"  papers  a  week  ago,  and,  not  having 
heard  from  it,  am  a  little  anxious.  I  always  want 
faith  that  a  bulky  manuscript  will  go  safe,  —  for 
all  I  never  lost  one.  ...  I  should  like  to  show 
you  the  result  here  when  we  are  fairly  in,  and 
the  spring  leaves  are  out.  It  is  the  brightest, 
cheerfullest,  homeliest  home  that  you  could 
see,  —  not  even  excepting  yours. 

The  pursuit  of  literature  under  such  circum 
stances  is  neither  natural  nor  profitable.  In 
Mrs.  Stowe's  case  it  proved  that  she  was  pur 
suing,  not  literature,  but  the  necessities  of  life. 
Everything  in  the  household  economy  now  de 
pended  upon  her  ;  and  however  strong  her  ten 
dencies  were  naturally,  she  no  longer  possessed 
the  reserved  strength  to  forge  the  work  from 
her  brain.  In  the  writing  of  "  Uncle  Tom," 
great  as  were  the  odds  against  her,  she  had 
been  preparing  to  that  end  from  the  moment  of 
her  birth.  Her  father's  fiery  powers  of  expres 
sion  ;  her  mother's  nature  absorbed  in  one  still 
dream  of  love  and  duty ;  her  own  solitary  child 
hood  in  spite  of  the  enormous  household  in 
which  she  was  brought  up ;  above  all  her  brood- 


186  DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE 

ing  nature  quietly  absorbing  and  assimilating 
the  knowledge  and  thought  which  were  finding 
expression  around  her ;  the  first  years  of  mar 
ried  life  in  Cincinnati,  where  the  slaves  were 
continually  harbored  and  assisted,  notwithstand 
ing  the  risks  to  life  and  property; — everything, 
in  short,  within  and  around  her  was  nourishing 
the  child  of  her  genius  which  was  to  leap  into 
being  and  gather  the  armies  of  America. 

On  the  whole  we  may  rather  wonder  at  the 
high  average  value  of  the  literary  work  by  which 
she  lived,  especially  when  we  follow  the  hints 
given  in  her  letters  of  her  interrupted  and 
crowded  existence. 

In  June,  1863,  she  says  :  "  I  wrote  my  piece 
in  a  sea  of  troubles.  I  had,  as  you  see,  to  write 
by  amanuensis,  and  yet  my  little  senate  of  girls 
say  they  like  it  better  than  anything  I  have 
written  yet."  It  was  a  touching  characteristic 
to  see  how  the  "senate  of  girls,"  or  of  such 
household  friends  as  she  could  muster  wherever 
she  might  be,  were  always  called  in  to  keep 
up  her  courage  and  to  give  her  a  sympathetic 
stimulus.  During  the  days  when  she  was  writ 
ing,  it  was  never  safe  to  be  far  away,  for  she  was 
rapid  as  light  itself,  and  before  a  brief  hour  was 
ended  we  were  pretty  sure  to  hear  her  voice 
calling  "  Do  come,  come  and  hear,  and  tell  me 
how  you  like  it." 

Her  June  letter  continues  :  "  Can  I  begin  to 
tell  you  what  it  is  to  begin  to  keep  house  in  an 


DAYS   WITH   MRS.  STOWE  187 

Unfinished  home  and  place,  dependent  on  a  car 
penter,  a  plumber,  a  mason,  a  bell-hanger,  who 
come  and  go  at  their  own  sweet  will,  breaking 
in,  making  all  sorts  of  chips,  dust,  dirt,  going  off 
in  the  midst  leaving  all  standing,  —  reappear 
ing  at  uncertain  intervals  and  making  more  dust, 
chips,  and  dirt.  One  parlor  and  my  library 
have  thus  risen  piecemeal  by  disturbance  and 
convulsions.  They  are  now  almost  done,  and 
the  last  box  of  books  is  almost  unpacked,  but 
my  head  aches  so  with  the  past  confusion  that 
I  cannot  get  up  any  feeling  of  rest.  I  can't 
enjoy  —  can't  feel  a  minute  to  sit  down  and  say 
'it  is  done.' 

"  The  fountain  plays,  the  plants  flourish,  and 
our  front  hall  minus  the  stair  railing  looks 
beautifully  ;  my  pictures  are  all  hung  in  parlor 
and  library,  and  yet  I  feel  so  unsettled.  Well, 
in  a  month  more  perhaps  I  shall  get  my  brains 
right  side  up." 

The  following  year  was  made  memorable  in 
Mrs.  Stowe's  life  by  the  marriage  of  her  young 
est  daughter.  Again  I  find  that  no  description 
can  begin  to  give  as  clearly  as  the  glimpses  in 
her  own  letters  the  multifarious  responsibilities 
which  beset  her.  She  says  :  "  I  am  in  trouble, 
—  have  been  in  trouble  ever  since  my  turtle 
doves  announced  their  intention  of  pairing  in 
June  instead  of  August,  because  it  entailed  on 
me  an  immediate  necessity  of  bringing  every 
thing  out  of  doors  and  in  to  a  state  of  complete- 


188  DAYS   WITH    MRS.   STOWE 

ness  for  the  wedding  exhibition  in  June.  The 
garden  must  be  planted,  the  lawn  graded,  har 
rowed,  rolled,  seeded,  and  the  grass  up  and 
growing,  stumps  got  out  and  trees  got  in,  con 
servatory  made  over,  belts  planted,  holes  filled, 
—  and  all  by  three  very  slippery  sort  of  Irish 
men  who  had  rather  any  time  be  minding  their 
own  business  than  mine.  I  have  back  door 
steps  to  be  made,  and  troughs,  screens,  and 
what  not ;  papering,  painting,  and  varnishing, 
hitherto  neglected,  to  be  completed  ;  also  spring 
house-cleaning  ;  also  dressmaking  for  one  bride 

and  three  ordinary  females  ;  also and 

and 's  wardrobes  to  be  overlooked ;  also 

carpets  to  be  made  and  put  down  ;  also  a  revo 
lution  in  the  kitchen  cabinet,  threatening  for  a 
time  to  blow  up  the  whole  establishment  alto 
gether."  And  so  the  letter  proceeds  with  two 
more  sheets,  adding  near  the  end  :  "  I  send 
you  to-day  a  ' Chimney- Corner  '  on  '  Our  Mar 
tyrs,'  which  I  have  written  out  of  the  fullness 
of  my  heart.  ...  It  is  an  account  of  the  martyr 
dom  of  a  Christian  boy  of  our  own  town  of  An- 
dover,  who  died  of  starvation  and  want  in  a 
Southern  prison  on  last  Christmas  Day." 

Just  one  month  before  the  marriage  she 
writes  again  :  "  The  wedding  is  indeed  an  ab 
sorbing  whirlpool,  but  amid  it  all  I  have  the 
next  '  Chimney-Corner  '  in  good  train  and  shall 
send  it  on  to-morrow  or  next  day." 

How  small  a  portion  of  the  world  outside 


DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE  189 

can  understand  the  lives  of  writers,  actors,  and 
those  whose  professions  compel  them  to  de 
pend  directly  upon  the  public  !  No  private  joy, 
no  private  sorrow,  no  rest,  no  change,  is  rec 
ognized  by  this  taskmaster.  It  is  well :  on  the 
whole  we  would  not  have  it  otherwise  ;  because 
those  who  can  minister  to  the  great  Public  em 
brace  their  profession  in  a  spirit  of  conscious 
or  unconscious  self-denial.  In  either  case  the 
result  is  the  same  :  development,  advancement, 
and  sometimes  attainment. 

The  wedding  is  not  two  days  over  when  an 
other  letter  arrives  full  of  her  literary  work, 
yet  adding  that  she  longs  for  rest  and  if  we 
will  only  tell  her  where  Campton  is,  whither  we 
had  gone,  she  would  gladly  join  us.  "  I  was  a 
weary  idiot,"  she  continues,  "by  the  time  the 
wedding  was  over,  and  said  'yes  ma'am '  to  the 
men  and  '  no  sir '  to  the  women  in  sheer  imbe 
cility." 

Nevertheless  she  did  not  get  to  Campton,  but 
kept  on,  with  the  exception  of  a  few  brief  vis 
its  at  Peekskill  and  elsewhere  until  the  autumn. 
In  one  of  her  notes  she  says :  "I  have  returned 

to  my  treadmill.  A is  to  leave  as  soon  as 

she  can  get  ready,  and  I  am  trying  to  see  her 
off  —  helping  her  to  get  her  things  together, 
and  trying  to  induce  her  to  take  a  new  stand 
in  a  new  place  and  make  herself  a  respectable 
woman.  When  she  is  gone  a  load  will  be  off 
my  back.  If  it  were  not  for  the  good  that  is 


190  DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE 

still  left  in  our  fellows  our  task  would  be  easier 
than  it  is ;  we  could  cut  them  adrift  and  let 
them  swim  ;  but  while  we  see  much  that  may 
be  turned  to  good  account  in  them  we  hang  on, 
or  let  them  hang  on,  and  our  boat  moves  slow. 
So  behold  me  fighting  my  good  fight  of  woman 
hood  against  dust  and  disorganization  and  the 
universal  downward  tendency  of  everybody, 
hoping  for  easier  times  by  and  by." 

With  her  heroic  nature  she  was  always  ready 
to  lead  the  forlorn  hope.  The  child  no'  one 
else  was  willing  to  provide  for,  the  woman  the 
world  despised,  were  brought  into  her  home 
and  cared  for  as  her  own.  Unhappily,  her  del 
icate  health  at  this  time  (though  she  was  nat 
urally  strong),  her  constant  literary  labors,  her 
uncertain  income,  her  private  griefs,  all  united, 
caused  her  to  fall  short  in  ability  to  accomplish 
what  she  undertook  ;  hence  there  were  often 
crises  from  sudden  illness  and  non-fulfillment 
of  engagements  which  were  very  serious  in 
their  effects,  but  the  elasticity  of  her  spirits 
was  something  marvelous  and  carried  her  over 
many  a  hard  place. 

In  the  autumn  of  1864  she  wrote :  "  I  feel  I 
need  to  write  in  these  days,  to  keep  from  think 
ing  of  things  that  make  me  dizzy  and  blind, 
and  fill  my  eyes  with  tears  so  that  I  cannot  see 
the  paper.  I  mean  such  things  as  are  being 
done  where  our  heroes  are  dying  as  Shaw  died. 
It  is  not  wise  that  all  our  literature  should  run 


DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE  191 

in  a  rut  cut  through  our  hearts  and  red  with 
our  blood.  I  feel  the  need  of  a  little  gentle 
household  merriment  and  talk  of  common 
things,  to  indulge  which  I  have  devised  the 
following." 

Notwithstanding  her  view  of  the  need  and 
her  skillfully  devised  plans  to  meet  it,  she  soon 
sent  another  epistle,  showing  how  impossible  it 
was  to  stem  the  current  of  her  thought. 

November  29,  1864. 

MY  DEAR  FRIEND,  —  I  have  sent  my  New 
Year's  article,  the  result  of  one  of  those  peculiar 
experiences  which  sometimes  occur  to  us  writ 
ers.  I  had  planned  an  article,  gay,  sprightly, 
wholly  domestic  ;  but  as  I  began  and  sketched 
the  pleasant  home  and  quiet  fireside,  an  irre 
sistible  impulse  wrote  for  me  what  followed,  — 
an  offering  of  sympathy  to  the  suffering  and 
agonized  whose  homes  have  forever  been  dark 
ened.  Many  causes  united  at  once  to  force  on 
me  this  vision,  from  which  generally  I  shrink, 
but  which  sometimes  will  not  be  denied,  —  will 
make  itself  felt. 

Just  before  I  went  to  New  York  two  of  my 
earliest  and  most  intimate  friends  lost  their 
oldest  sons,  captains  and  majors,  —  splendid  fel 
lows  physically  and  morally,  beautiful,  brave, 
religious,  uniting  the  courage  of  soldiers  to  the 
faith  of  martyrs,  —  and  when  I  went  to  Brook 
lyn  it  seemed  as  if  I  were  hearing  some  such 


192  DAYS   WITH    MRS.   STOWE 

thing  almost  every  day ;  and  Henry,  in  his  pro 
fession  as  minister,  has  so  many  letters  full  of 
imploring  anguish,  the  cry  of  hearts  breaking 
that  ask  help  of  him.  .  .  . 

It  was  during  one  of  Mrs.  Stowe's  visits  to 
Boston  in  the  ensuing  year  that  she  chanced  to 
talk  with  greater  fullness  and  openness  than 
she  had  done  with  us  before  on  the  subject  of 
Spiritualism.  In  the  simplest  way  she  affirmed 
her  entire  belief  in  manifestations  of  the  near 
ness  and  individual  life  of  the  unseen,  and  gave 
vivid  illustrations  of  the  reasons  why  her  faith 
was  thus  assured.  She  never  sought  after  such 
testimony,  so  far  as  I  am  aware,  unless  it  may 
have  been  to  sit  with  others  who  were  inter 
ested,  but  her  conclusions  were  definite  and 
unvarying.  At  that  period  such  a  declaration 
of  faith  required  a  good  deal  of  bravery  ;  now 
the  subject  has  assumed  a  different  phase,  and 
there  are  few  thinking  people  who  do  not  rec 
ognize  a  certain  truth  hidden  within  the  shad 
ows.  She  spoke  with  tender  seriousness  of 
"spiritual  manifestations"  as  recorded  in  the 
New  Testament  and  in  the  prophets.  From 
his  early  youth  her  husband  had  possessed  the 
peculiar  power  of  seeing  persons  about  him  who 
could  not  be  perceived  by  others  ;  visions  so 
distinct  that  it  was  impossible  for  him  to  dis 
tinguish  at  times  between  the  real  and  the 
unreal.  I  recall  one  illustration  which  had  oc- 


DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE  193 

curred  only  a  few  years  previous  to  their  de 
parture  from  Andover.  She  had  been  called 
to  Boston  one  day  on  business.  Making  her 
preparations  hurriedly,  she  bade  the  household 
farewell,  and  rushed  to  the  station,  only  to  see 
the  train  go  out  as  she  arrived.  There  was 
nothing  to  do  but  to  return  home  and  wait  pa 
tiently  for  the  next  train  ;  but  wishing  not  to 
be  disturbed,  she  quietly  opened  a  side  door 
and  crept  noiselessly  up  the  staircase  leading 
to  her  own  room,  sitting  down  by  her  writing- 
table  in  the  window.  She  had  been  seated 
about  half  an  hour  when  Professor  Stowe  came 
in,  looked  about  him  with  a  preoccupied  air,  but 
did  not  speak  to  her.  She  thought  his  beha 
vior  strange,  and  amused  herself  by  watching 
him ;  at  last  the  situation  became  so  extraordi 
nary  that  she  began  to  laugh.  "  Why,"  he  ex 
claimed,  with  a  most  astonished  air,  "  is  that 
you  ?  I  thought  it  was  one  of  my  visions  !  " 

It  may  seem  a  singular  antithesis  to  say  of 
the  writer  of  one  of  the  greatest  stories  the 
world  has  yet  produced  that  she  was  not  a 
student  of  literature.  Books  as  a  medium  of 
the  ideas  of  the  age,  and  as  the  promulgators 
of  morals  and  religion,  were  of  course  like  the 
breath  of  her  life ;  but  a  study  of  the  literature 
of  the  past  as  the  only  true  foundation  for  a 
literature  of  the  present  was  outside  the  pale  of 
her  occupations,  and  for  the  larger  portion  of 
her  life  outside  of  her  interest.  During  the 


I94  DAYS   WITH   MRS.  STOWE 

riper  season  of  her  activity  with  the  pen,  the 
necessity  of  studying  style  and  the  thoughts  of 
others  gained  a  larger  hold  upon  her  mind  ;  but 
she  always  said,  with  a  twinkle  of  amusement 
and  pride,  that  she  never  could  have  done  any 
thing  without  Mr.  Stowe.  He  knew  every 
thing,  and  all  she  had  to  do  was  to  go  to  him. 
Of  her  great  work  she  has  written,  in  that  noble 
introduction  to  the  illustrated  edition  of  "  Uncle 
Tom  "  speaking  of  herself  in  the  third  person  : 
"The  story  can  less  be  said  to  have  been  "com 
posed  by  her  than  imposed  upon  her.  .  .  .  The 
book  insisted  upon  getting  itself  into  being,  and 
would  take  no  denial." 

It  is  easily  seen  that  it  was  neither  a  spirit  of 
depreciation  of  knowledge  nor  lack  of  power  to 
become  a  student  which  made  her  fail  to  obtain 
adjuncts  indispensable  to  great  writers,  but  her 
feet  were  led  in  other  paths  and  her  strength 
was  needed  for  other  ends.  Madame  George 
Sand  said,  writing  of  "  Uncle  Tom  "  soon  after 
its  publication  :  "  If  its  judges,  possessed  with 
the  love  of  what  they  call  '  artistic  work,'  find  un 
skillful  treatment  in  the  book,  look  well  at  them 
to  see  if  their  eyes  are  dry  when  they  are  read 
ing  this  or  that  chapter.  ...  I  cannot  say  that 
Mrs.  Stowe  has  talent,  as  one  understands  it  in 
the  world  of  letters,  but  she  has  genius,  as  hu 
manity  feels  the  need  of  genius,  —  the  genius 
of  goodness,  not  that  of  the  rules  of  letters,  but 
of  the  saint." 


DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE  195 

All  her  life  she  stimulated  the  activity  of  her 
pen  rather  by  her  sympathy  with  humanity  than 
by  studies  of  literature.  In  one  of  her  letters 
she  says  :  "  You  see  whoever  can  write  on  home 
and  family  matters,  on  what  people  think  of  and 
are  anxious  about  and  want  to  hear  from,  has 
an  immense  advantage.  The  success  of  the 
'  House  and  Home  Papers '  shows  me  how 
much  people  want  this  sort  of  thing,  and  now 
I  am  bringing  the  series  to  a  close  I  find  I  have 
ever  so  much  more  to  say;  in  fact,  the  idea 
has  come  in  this  shape.  ...  A  set  of  papers 
for  the  next  year  to  be  called  *  Christopher's 
Evenings,'  which  will  allow  great  freedom  and 
latitude  ;  a  capacity  of  striking  anywhere  when 
a  topic  seems  to  be  in  the  public  mind  and 
that  will  comprise  a  little  series  of  sketches  or 
rather  little  groups  of  sketches  out  of  which 
books  may  be  made.  You  understand  Chris 
topher  writes  these  for  the  winter-evening 
amusement  of  his  family.  One  set  will  be  en 
titled  '  An  Account  of  the  Seven  Little  Foxes 
that  spoil  the  Vines.'  This  will  cover  seven 
sketches  of  certain  domestic  troubles.  Another 
set  is  the  *  Cathedral ;  or,  the  Shrines  of  Home 
Saints,'  under  which  I  shall  give  certain  sketches 
of  home  characters  contrasting  with  that  of  the 
legends  of  the  saints  :  the  shirt-making,  knit 
ting,  whooping-cough-tending  saints,  the  Aunt 
Esthers  and  Aunt  Marias.  .  .  .  Hum  (her  hum 
ming  bird)  is  well  —  notwithstanding  the  dull 


196  DAYS   WITH    MRS.   STOWE 

weather ;  we  keep  him  in  a  sunny  upper  cham 
ber  and  feed  him  daily  on  sugar  and  water,  and 
he  catches  his  own  mutton." 

Thus  in  swift  succession  we  find,  not  only 
charming  little  idyls  here  and  there  like  her 
story  of  "Hum  the  Son  of  Buzz"  in  the  "Young 
Folks  Magazine,"  being  the  tale  of  her  cap 
tured  and  tamed  humming-bird,  but  also  "  Lit 
tle  Foxes,"  "The  Chimney-Corner,"  a  volume 
of  collected  Poems,  "Oldtown  Folks,"  "Sam 
Lawson's  Fireside  Tales  "  and  others,  following 
with  tireless  rapidity,  bearing  the  same  stamp 
of  living  sympathy  with  difficulties  of  the  time 
and  breathing  a  spirit  of  helpfulness  and  faith. 

At  this  period,  as  she  had  an  accessible  home 
in  the  pleasant  city  of  Hartford,  strangers  and 
travelers  often  sought  and  found  her.  In  one 
of  her  familiar  notes  of  1867  she  wrote  :  "The 
Amberleys  have  written  that  they  are  coming 
to  us  to-morrow,  and  of  all  times,  accordingly, 
our  furnace  must  spring  a  leak.  We  are  hop 
ing  to  make  all  right  before  they  get  here,  but 
I  am  really  ashamed  to  show  such  weather  at 
this  time  of  year.  Poor  America!  It's  like 
having  your  mother  expose  herself  by  a  fit  of 
ill  temper  before  strangers.  .  .  .  Do,  I  beg, 
write  to  a  poor  sinner  laboring  under  a  book." 
And  again,  a  little  later  :  "  The  book  is  almost 
done  —  hang  it !  but  done  well,  and  will  be  a 
good  thing  for  young  men  to  read,  and  young 
women  too,  and  so  I  '11  send  you  one.  You  '11 


DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE  197 

find  some  things  in  it,  I  fancy,  that  I  know  and 
you  don't,  about  the  times  before  you  were 
born,  when  I  was  '  Hush,  hush,  my  dear-ing ' 
in  Cincinnati.  ...  I  smell  spring  afar  off  — 
sniff  —  do  you  ?  Any  smell  of  violets  in  the 
distance  ?  I  think  it  comes  over  the  water  from 
the  Pamfili  Doria." 

Among  other  responsibilities  assumed  by  her 
at  this  time  was  that  of  getting  Professor  Stowe 
to  consent  to  publish  a  book.  This  was  no 
laughing  matter  ;  at  first  the  book  was  planned 
merely  as  an  article  on  the  "  Talmud  "  for  the 
"Atlantic  Magazine."  Afterwards  Professor 
Stowe  enlarged  the  design.  Later  in  speaking 
of  his  manuscript  she  says :  "  You  must  not 
scare  him  off  by  grimly  declaring  that  you  must 
have  the  whole  manuscript  complete  before  you 
set  the  printer  to  work;  you  must  take  the 
three  quarters  he  brings  you  and  at  least  make 
believe  begin  printing,  and  he  will  immedi 
ately  go  to  work  and  finish  up  the  whole  ;  other 
wise  what  with  lectures  and  the  original  sin  of 
laziness,  it  will  all  be  indefinitely  postponed.  I 
want  to  make  a  crisis  that  he  shall  feel  that 
now  is  the  accepted  time,  and  that  this  must  be 
finished  first  and  foremost." 

And  again  she  says :  "  My  poor  Rab  has 
been  sick  with  a  heavy  cold  this  week,  and  if  it 
had  n't  been  for  me  you  would  n't  have  had 
this  article  which  I  send  in  triumph.  I  plunged 
into  the  sea  of  Rabbis  and  copied  Mr.  Stowe's 


198  DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE 

insufferable  chaldonic  characters  so  that  you 
might  not  have  your  life  taken  by  wrathful 
printers.  .  .  .  Thus  I  have  ushered  into  the 
world  a  document  which  I  venture  to  say  con 
denses  more  information  on  an  obscure  and  cu 
rious  subject  than  any  in  the  known  world  — 
Hosanna ! " 

In  these  busy  years  she  went  away  upon  her 
Boston  trips  more  and  more  rarely,  but  she 
writes  after  her  return  from  one  of  them  in 
1868:  "I  don't  think  I  ever  enjoyed  Boston 
so  much  as  in  this  visit.  Why  was  it !  Every 
cloud  seemed  to  turn  out  its  silver  lining,  every 
body  was  delightful,  and  the  music  has  really 
done  me  good.  I  feel  it  all  over  me  now.  I 
think  of  it  with  a  sober  certainty  of  waking 
bliss  !  our  little  '  hub '  is  a  grand  '  hub.'  Three 
cheers  f or  it !  ...  I  have  had  sent  me  through 
the  War  Department  a  French  poem  which  I 
think  is  full  of  real  nerve  and  strength  of  feel 
ing.  I  undertook  the  reading  only  as  a  duty, 
but  found  myself  quite  waked  up.  The  indig 
nation  and  the  feeling  with  which  he  denounces 
modern  skepticism,  that  worst  of  all  unbelief, 
the  denial  of  all  good,  all  beauty,  all  generosity, 
all  heroism,  is  splendid.  He  is  a  live  man  this, 
and  I  wish  you  would  read  his  poem  and  send 
it  to  Longfellow,  for  it  does  one's  heart  good 
to  see  the  French  made  the  vehicle  of  so  much 
real  heroic  sentiment.  The  description  of  a 
slave  hunt  is  splendidly  and  bitterly  satirical 


DAYS   WITH    MRS.   STOWE  199 

and  indignant  and  full  of  fine  turns  of  language. 
Thank  God  that  is  over.  No  matter  what  hap 
pens  to  you  and  me,  that  great  burden  of  sin 
and  misery  has  tumbled  off  from  our  backs 
and  rolled  into  the  sepulchre,  where  it  shall 
never  arise  more.  ...  I  have  been  the  most 
industrious  of  beings  since  my  return,  and  am 
steaming  away  on  the  obstacle  that  stands  be 
tween  me  and  my  story,  which  I  long  to  be 
at.  ...  I  want  to  get  one  or  two  special  bits  of 
information  out  of  Garrison,  and  so  instead  of 
sending  my  letter  at  random  to  Boston  I  will 
trouble  you  (who  have  little  or  nothing  to  do  !) 
to  get  this  letter  to  him.  My  own  book,  instead 
of  cooling,  boils  and  bubbles  daily  and  nightly, 
and  I  am  pushing  and  spurring  like  fury  to  get 
to  it.  I  work  like  a  drag-horse,  and  I  '11  never 
get  in  such  a  scrape  again.  It  is  n't  my  busi 
ness  to  make  up  books,  but  to  make  them.  I 
have  lots  to  say."  .  .  . 

The  story  which  had  so  taken  possession  of 
her  mind  and  heart  was  "  Oldtown  Folks,"  the 
one  which  she  at  the  time  fancied  the  best  cal 
culated  of  all  her  works  to  sustain  the  repu 
tation  of  the  author  of  "Uncle  Tom's  Cabin." 
The  many  proofs  of  her  own  interest  in  it  seem 
to  show  that  she  had  been  moved  to  a  livelier 
and  deeper  satisfaction  in  this  creation  than  in 
any  of  her  later  productions.  She  writes  re 
specting  it  :  "  It  is  more  to  me  than  a  story  ;  it 
is  my  resume  of  the  whole  spirit  and  body  of 


200  DAYS   WITH   MRS.  STOWE 

New  England,  a  country  that  is  now  exerting 
such  an  influence  on  the  civilized  world  that  to 
know  it  truly  becomes  an  object."  But  there 
were  weary  lengths  of  roads  to  be  traveled  by 
a  woman  already  overladen  with  responsibilities 
and  in  delicate  health  before  such  a  book  could 
reach  its  consummation. 

"  I  must  cry  you  mercy,"  she  begins  one  of 
the  notes -to  her  publisher,  "and  explain  my 
condition  to  you  as  well  as  possible."  The 
"condition"  was  frequently  to  be  explained! 
Proofs  were  not  ready  when  they  were  prom- 
.  ised,  the  press  was  stopped,  and  both  author 
and  publisher  required  all  the  tender  regard 
they  really  had  for  each  other  and  all  the  pa 
tience  they  possessed  to  keep  in  tune.  She 
says,  "  I  am  sorry  to  trouble  you  or  derange 
your  affairs,  but  one  can't  always  tell  in  driving 
such  horses  as  we  drive  where  they  are  going 
to  bring  up." 

She  started  off  in  this  long  journey  very 
hopefully,  writing  that  she  would  like  to  begin 
printing  at  once,  because  "  to  have  the  first  part 
of  my  book  in  type  will  greatly  assist  me  in  the 
last."  A  month  later 'she  writes  :  "  Here  goes 
the  first  of  my  nameless  story,  of  which  I  can 
only  say  it  is  as  unlike  everything  else  as  it  is 
like  the  strange  world  of  folks  I  took  it  from. 
There  is  no  fear  that  there  will  not  be  as  much 
matter  as  *  Uncle  Tom's  Cabin,'  —  there  will. 
There  could  be  an  endless  quantity  if  I  only 


DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE  201 

said  all  I  can  see  and  think  that  is  strange  and 

curious.     I   partake   in  's  disappointment 

that  it  is  not  done,  but  it  is  of  that  class  of 
things  that  cannot  be  commanded  ;  as  my 
friend  Sam  Lawson  (vide  MSS.)  says,  '  There 's 
things  that  can  be  druv  and  then  agin  there 's 
things  that  can't,'  and  this  is  that  kind  —  as 
had  to  be  humored.  Instead  of  rushing  on,  I 
have  often  turned  back  and  written  uv*r  with 
care,  that  nothing  that  I  wanted  to  say  might 
be  omitted  ;  it  has  cost  me  a  good  deal  of  labor 
to  elatorate  this  first  part,  namely,  to  build  my 
theatre  and  to  introduce  my  actors.  My  labor 
has  all,  however,  been  given  to  the  literary  part. 
My  printers  always  inform  me  that  I  know 
nothing  of  punctuation,  and  I  give  thanks  that 
I  have  no  responsibility  for  any  of  its  absurdi 
ties  !  Further  than  beginning  my  sentence 
with  a  capital,  I  go  not,  —  so  I  hope  my  friend 
Mr.  Bigelow,  who  is  a  direct  and  lineal  descend 
ant  of  'my  Grandmother,'  will  put  those  things 
all  right." 

Who  so  well  as  authors  can  fully  understand 
and  sympathize  with  the  burden  of  a  long  story 
in  the  head,  long  bills  on  the  table,  tempting 
offers  to  write  for  this  and  that  in  order  to  bring 
in  two  hundred  dollars  from  a  variety  of  pleas 
ant  editors  who  desire  the  name  on  their  list, 
house  and  grounds  to  be  looked  after,  cooks  to 
be  pacified,  visits  to  be  made ;  —  it  is  no  wonder 
that  Mrs.  Stowe  wrote :  "  The  thing  has  been 


202  DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE 

an  awful  tax  and  labor,  for  I  have  tried  to  do  it 
well.  I  say  also  to  you  confidentially,  that  it 
has  seemed  as  if  every  private  care  that  could 
hinder  me  as  woman  and  mother  has  been 
crowded  into  just  this  year  that  I  have  had  this 
to  do." 

Happily  more  peaceful  days  were  in  store  for 
her.  Her  daughters,  now  grown  to  woman 
hood,  we:  e  beginning  to  take  the  reins  of  home 
work  and  government  into  their  own  hands ; 
and  as  the  darkest  hour  foreruns  the  dawn,  so 
almost  imperceptibly  to  herself  her  cares  began 
to  fade  away  from  her. 

A  new  era  opened  in  Mrs.  Stowe's  life  when 
she  made  her  first  visit  to  Florida,  in  the  win 
ter  of  1 867.  She  was  tired  and  benumbed  with 
care  and  cold.  Suddenly  the  thought  came  to 
her  that  she  would  go  to  the  South,  herself, 
and  see  what  the  stories  were  worth  which  she 
was  constantly  hearing  about  its  condition.  In 
the  mean  time,  if  she  could,  she  would  enjoy 
the  soft  air,  and  find  retirement  in  which  she 
might  continue  her  book.  She  says  in  one  of 
her  letters  :  — 

"Winter  weather  and  cold  seem  always  a 
kind  of  nightmare  to  me.  I  am  going  to  take 
my  writing-desk  and  go  down  to  Florida  to 

F 's  plantation,  where  we  have  now  a  home, 

and  abide  there  until  the  heroic  agony  of  be- 
tweenity,  the  freeze  and  thaw  of  winter,  is  over, 
and  then  I  doubt  not  I  can  write  my  three 


DAYS   WITH    MRS.   STOWE  203 

hours  a  day.  Meanwhile,  I  have  a  pretty  good 
pile  of  manuscript.  .  .  .  The  letters  I  have  got 
about  blossoming  roses  and  loungers  in  linen 
coats,  while  we  have  been  frozen  and  snowed 
up,  have  made  my  very  soul  long  to  be  away. 
Cold  weather  really  seems  to  torpify  my  brain. 
I  write  with  a  heavy  numbness.  I  have  not 
yet  had  a  good  spell  of  writing,  though  I  have 
had  ail  through  the  story  abundant  clairvoy 
ance,  and  see  just  how  it  must  be  written;  but 
for  writing  some  parts  I  want  warm  weather, 
and  not  to  be  in  the  state  of  a  'froze  and 
thawed  apple.'  .  .  .  The  cold  affects  me  pre 
cisely  as  extreme  hot  weather  used  to  in  Cin 
cinnati,  —  gives  me  a  sort  of  bilious  neuralgia. 
I  hope  to  get  a  clear,  bright  month  in  Florida, 
when  I  can  say  something  to  purpose. 

"  I  did  want  to  read  some  of  my  story  to  you 
before  I  went.  I  have  read  it  to  my  husband  ; 
and  though  one  may  think  a  husband  a  partial 
judge,  yet  mine  is  so  nervous  and  so  afraid  of 
being  bored  that  I  feel  as  if  it  were  something 
to  hold  him ;  and  he  likes  it  —  is  quite  wake 
ful,  so  to  speak,  about  it.  All  I  want  now,  to 
go  on,  is  a  good  frame,  as  father  used  to  say 
about  his  preaching.  I  want  calm,  soft,  even 
dreamy,  enjoyable  weather,  sunshine  and  flow 
ers.  Love  to  dear  A ,  whom  I  so  much 

want  to  see  once  more." 

Unhappily,  she  could  not  get  away  so  soon 
as  she  desired.  There  were  contracts  to  be 


204  DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE 

signed  and  other  business  to  arrange.  These 
delays  made  her  visit  southward  much  shorter 
than  she  intended,  but  it  proved  to  be  only  the 
introduction,  the  first  brief  chapter,  as  it  were, 
of  her  future  winter  life  in  Florida.  Before 
leaving  she  wrote  as  follows  to  her  publisher :  — 

"I  am  so  constituted  that  it  is  absolutely 
fatal  to  me  to  agree  to  have  any  literary  work 
done  at  certain  dates.  I  mean  to  have  this 
story  done  by  the  ist  of  September.  It  would 
be  greatly  for  my  pecuniary  interest  to  get  it 
done  before  that,  because  I  have  the  offer  of 
eight  thousand  dollars  for  the  newspaper  use 
of  the  story  I  am  planning  to  write  after  it. 
But  I  am  bound  by  the  laws  of  art.  Sermons, 
essays,  lives  of  distinguished  people,  I  can 
write  to  order  at  times  and  seasons.  A  story 
comes,  grows  like  a  flower,  sometimes  will  and 
sometimes  won't,  like  a  pretty  woman.  When 
the  spirits  will  help,  I  can  write.  When  they 
jeer,  flout,  make  faces,  and  otherwise  maltreat 
me,  I  can  only  wait  humbly  at  their  gates, 
watch  at  the  posts  of  their  doors. 

"This  story  grows  even  when  I  do  not  write. 
I  spent  a  month  in  the  mountains  in  Stock- 
bridge  composing  before  I  wrote  a  word. 

"  I  only  ask  now  a  good  physical  condition, 
and  I  go  to  warmer  climes  hoping  to  save  time 
there.  I  put  everything  and  everybody  off  that 
interferes  with  this,  except  '  Pussy  Willow/ 
which  will  be  a  pretty  story  for  a  child's 
'series.' " 


DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE  205 

At  last  she  sailed  away,  about  the  ist  of 
March,  1867,  with  that  delightful  power  of 
knowing  what  she  wanted,  and  being  content 
when  she  attained  her  end,  which  is  too  rare, 
alas !  Her  letters  glowed  and  blossomed  and 
shone  with  the  fruit  and  flowers  and  sunshine 
of  the  South.  It  was  hardly  to  be  expected 
that  her  literary  work  could  actually  reach  the 
printers'  hands  under  these  circumstances  as 
rapidly  as  if  she  had  been  able  to  write  at 
home:  therefore  it  was  with  no  sense  of  sur 
prise  that  we  received  from  her,  during  the 
summer  of  1868,  what  proved  to  be  a  chapter 
of  excuses  instead  of  a  chapter  of  her  book  : 
"  I  have  a  long  story  to  tell  you  of  what  has  pre 
vented  my  going  on  with  my  story,  which  you 
must  see  would  so  occupy  all  the  nerve  and 
brain  force  I  have  that  I  have  not  been  able  to 
write  a  word  except  to  my  own  children.  To 
them  in  their  needs  I  must  write  chapters  which 
would  otherwise  go  into  my  novel." 

About  this  period  she  found  herself  able  to 
come  again  to  Boston  for  a  few  days'  visit. 
There  were  often  long  croonings  over  the  fire 
far  into  the  night  ;  her  other-worldliness  and 
abstractions  brought  with  them  a  dreamy  qui 
etude,  especially  to  those  whose  harried  lives 
kept  them  only  too  much  awake.  Her  coming 
was  always  a  pleasure,  for  she  made  holidays 
by  her  own  delightful  presence,  and  she  asked 
nothing  more  than  what  she  found  in  the  com 
panionship  of  her  friends. 


206  DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE 

After  her  return  to  Hartford  and  in  Decem 
ber  of  the  same  year,  I  find  some  curious  notes 
showing  how  easily  she  was  attracted  by  new 
subjects  of  interest  away  from  the  work  she  had 
in  hand ;  not  that  she  saw  it  in  that  light,  or 
was  aware  that  her  story  was  in  the  least  re 
tarded  by  such  digressions,  but  her  keen  sym 
pathy  with  everything  and  everybody  made  it 
more  and  more  difficult  for  her  to  concentrate 
her  power  upon  the  long  story  which  she  con 
sidered  after  all  of  the  first  importance.  '  She 
writes  to  the  editor  of  the  "Atlantic  Monthly : " 
"  I  see  that  all  the  leading  magazines  have  a 
leading  article  on  'Planchette.' 

"  There  is  a  lady  of  my  acquaintance  who  has 
developed  more  remarkable  facts  in  this  way 
than  any  I  have  ever  seen ;  I  have  kept  a  record 
of  these  communications  for  some  time  past, 
and  everybody  is  very  much  struck  with  them. 

"  I  have  material  to  prepare  a  very  curious 
article.  Shall  you  want  it  ?  And  when  ?  " 

We  can  imagine  the  feeling  of  a  publisher 
waiting  for  copy  of  her  promised  story  on  read 
ing  this  note  !  Also  the  following  of  a  few 
days  later :  — 

"  I  am  beginning  a  series  of  articles  called 
'  Learning  to  Write,'  designed  to  be  helpful  to 
a  great  many  beginners.  ,  .  .  I  shall  instance 
Hawthorne  as  a  model  and  speak  of  his  '  Note 
Book '  as  something  which  every  young  author 
aspiring  to  write  should  study.  .  .  .  My  mate- 


DAYS    WITH    MRS.   STOWE  207 

rials  for  the  '  Planchette '  article  are  really  very 
extraordinary,  .  .  .  but  I  don't  want  to  write  it 
now  when  I  am  driving  so  hard  upon  my  book. 
...  It  costs  some  patience  to  you  and  certainly 
to  me  to  have  it  take  so  long,  yet  I  have  con 
scientiously  done  all  I  could,  since  I  began. 
Now  the  end  of  it  is  in  plain  sight,  but  there  is 
a  good  deal  to  be  done  to  bring  it  out  worthily, 
and  I  work  upon  it  steadily  and  daily.  I  never 
put  so  much  work  into  anything  before." 

A  week  later  she  says  again  :  — 

"  I  thank  you  very  much  for  your  encour 
aging  words,  for  I  really  need  them.  I  have 
worked  so  hard  that  I  am  almost  tired.  I  hope 
that  you  will  still  continue  to  read,  and  that  you 
will  not  find  it  dull.  ...  I  have  received  the 
books.  What  a  wonderful  fellow  Hawthorne 
was ! " 

There  is  something  truly  touching  to  those 
who  knew  her  in  that  phrase  "  almost  tired." 
Indeed,  she  was  truly  tired  through  and 
through,  and  these  later  letters  from  which  I 
have  made  the  foregoing  extracts  are  all  writ 
ten  by  an  amanuensis. 

Happily  the  time  was  near  for  a  second  flight 
to  Florida,  and  she  wrote  with  her  own  rested 
hand  en  route  from  Charleston  :  — 

"  Room  fragrant  with  violets,  banked  up  in 
hyacinths,  flowers  everywhere,  windows  open, 
birds  singing." 

She  enclosed  some  fans,  upon  which  she  had 


208  DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE 

been  painting  flowers  busily  during  the  journey 
in  order  to  send  them  back  to  Boston  to  be  sold 
at  a  fair  in  behalf  of  the  Cretans  :  "  Make  them 
do  the  Cretes  all  the  good  you  can,"  she  said. 

It  appears  that  by  this  time  "Oldtown 
Folks"  was  fairly  off  her  hands,  and  she  was 
free  once  more.  She  evidently  found  Manda 
rin  very  much  to  her  mind,  and  wrote  content 
edly  therefrom,  save  for  a  vision  of  having  to 
go  to  Canada  in  the  early  spring  to  obtain  the 
copyright  of  her  story. 

The  visits  to  Florida  had  now  become  neces 
sary  to  her  health.  She  saw  the  next  step  to 
take  was  to  surrender  her  large  house  in  Hart 
ford  and  pass  her  winters  altogether  at  the 
South.  She  wrote  from  Florida :  "  I  am  leav 
ing  the  land  of  flowers  on  the  ist  of  June  with 
tears  in  my  eyes,  but  having  a  house  in  Hart 
ford,  it  must  be  lived  in.  I  wish  you  and 

would  just  come  to  see  it.  You  have  no  idea 
what  a  lovely  place  it  has  grown  to  be,  and  I 
am  trying  to  sell  it  as  hard  as  a  snake  to  crawl 
out  of  his  skin.  Thus  on,  till  reason  is  pushed 
out  of  life.  There 's  no  earthly  sense  in  having 
anything,  —  lordy  massy,  no  !  By  the  bye,  I 
must  delay  sending  you  the  ghost  in  the  Cap 
tain  Brown  house  till  I  can  go  to  Natick  and 
make  a  personal  inspection  of  the  premises  and 
give  it  to  you  hot." 

Her  busy  brain  was  again  at  work  with  new 
plans  for  future  books  and  articles  for  maga- 


DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE  209 

zines.  "  Gladly  would  I  fly  to  you  on  the 
wings  of  the  wind,"  she  says,  "but  I  am  a  slave, 
a  bound  thrall  to  work,  and  I  cannot  work  and 
play  at  the  same  time.  After  this  year  I  hope 
to  have  a  little  rest,  and  above  all  things  I 
won't  be  hampered  with  a  serial  to  write.  .  .  . 
We  have  sold  out  in  Hartford." 

All  this  routine  of  labor  was  to  have  a  new 
form  of  interruption,  which  gave  her  intense 
joy.  "  I  am  doing  just  what  you  say,"  she 
wrote,  "being  first  lady-in-waiting  on  his  new 
majesty.  He  is  very  pretty,  very  gracious  and 
good,  and  his  little  mamma  and  he  are  a  pair. 
...  I  am  getting  to  be  an  old  fool  of  a 
grandma,  and  to  think  there  is  no  bliss  under 
heaven  to  compare  with  a  baby."  Later  she 
wrote  on  the  same  subject :  "You  ought  to  see 
my  baby.  I  have  discovered  a  way  to  end  the 
woman  controversy.  Let  the  women  all  say 
that  they  won't  take  care  of  the  babies  till  the 
laws  are  altered.  One  week  of  this  discipline 
would  bring  all  the  men  on  their  marrow-bones. 
Only  tell  us  what  you  want,  they  would  say, 
and  we  will  do  it.  Of  course  you  may  imagine 
me  trailing  after  our  little  king,  —  first  granny- 
in- waiting." 

In  the  summer  of  1869  there  was  a  pleasant 
home  at  St.  John's  Wood,  in  London,  which 
possessed  peculiar  attractions.  Other  houses 
were  as  comfortable  to  look  at,  other  hedges 


2io  DAYS   WITH    MRS.   STOWE 

were  as  green,  other  drawing-rooms  were  gayer, 
but  this  was  the  home  of  George  Eliot,  and  on 
Sunday  afternoons  the  resort  of  those  who  de 
sired  the  best  that  London  had  to  give.  Here 
it  was  that  George  Eliot  told  us  of  her  admira 
tion  and  deep  regard,  her  affection,  for  Mrs. 
Stowe.  Her  reverence  and  love  were  expressed 
with  such  tremulous  sincerity  that  the  speaker 
won  our  hearts  by  her  love  for  our  friend. 
Many  letters  had  already  passed  between  Mrs. 
Stowe  and  herself,  and  she  confided  to  us  her 
amusement  at  a  fancy  Mrs.  Stowe  had  taken 
that  Casaubon,  in  "  Middlemarch,"  was  drawn 
from  the  character  of  Mr.  Lewes.  Mrs.  Stowe 
took  it  so  entirely  for  granted  in  her  letters  that 
it  was  impossible  to  dispossess  her  mind  of  the 
illusion.  Evidently  it  was  the  source  of  much 
harmless  household  amusement  at  St.  John's 
Wood.  I  find  in  Mrs.  Stowe's  letters  some 
pleasant  allusions  to  this  correspondence.  She 
writes :  "  We  were  all  full  of  George  Eliot 
when  your  note  came,  as  I  had  received  a 
beautiful  letter  from  her  in  answer  to  one  I 
wrote  from  Florida.  She  is  a  noble,  true  wo 
man  ;  and  if  anybody  does  n't  see  it,  so  much 
the  worse  for  them,  and  not  her."  In  a  note 
written  about  that  time  Mrs.  Stowe  says  she 
is  "coming  to  Boston,  and  will  bring  George 
Eliot's  letters  with  her  that  we  may  read  them 
together ; "  but  that  pleasant  plan  was  only  one 
of  the  imagination,  and  was  never  carried  out. 


DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE  211 

Her  own  letter  to  Mrs.  Lewes,  written  from 
Florida  in  March,  1876,  may  be  considered  one 
of  the  most  beautiful  and  interesting  pieces  of 
writing  she  ever  achieved. 

Although  this  letter  is  accessible  in  a  life  of 
Mrs.  Stowe  published  by  her  son  during  her 
life,  I  am  tempted  to  reproduce  a  portion  of  it 
in  these  pages  for  those  who  have  not  seen 
it  elsewhere.  It  is  a  positive  loss  to  cut  such 
a  letter,  but  it  covers  too  much  space  to  quote 
in  full.  She  dates  in 

ORANGE  BLOSSOM  TIME,  MANDARIN, 
March  18,  1876. 

MY  DEAR  FRIEND,  —  I  always  think  of  you 
when  the  orange-trees  are  in  blossom;  just  now 
they  are  fuller  than  ever,  and  so  many  bees  are 
filling  the  branches  that  the  air  is  full  of  a  sort 
of  still  murmur.  And  now  I  am  beginning  to 
hear  from  you  every  month  in  "Harper's."  It 
is  as  good  as  a  letter.  "  Daniel  Deronda"  has 
succeeded  in  awaking  in  my  somewhat  worn- 
out  mind  an  interest.  So  many  stories  are 
tramping  over  one's  mind  in  every  modern 
magazine  nowadays  that  one  is  macadamized, 
so  to  speak.  It  takes  something  unusual  to 
make  a  sensation.  This  does  excite  and  inter 
est  me,  as  I  wait  for  each  number  with  eager 
ness.  I  wish  I  could  endow  you  with  our  long 
winter  weather,  —  not  winter,  except  such  as 
you  find  in  Sicily.  We  live  here  from  Novem 
ber  to  June,  and  my  husband  sits  outdoors  on 


212  DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE 

the  veranda  and  reads  all  day.  We  emigrate 
in  solid  family ;  my  two  dear  daughters,  hus 
band,  self,  and  servants  come  together  to  spend 
the  winter  here,  and  so  together  to  our  North 
ern  home  in  summer.  My  twin  daughters  re 
lieve  me  from  all  domestic  care ;  they  are  lively, 
vivacious,  with  a  real  genius  for  practical  life. 
...  It  was  very  sweet  and  kind  of  you  to  write 
what  you  did  last.  I  suppose  it  is  so  long  ago 
you  may  have  forgotten,  but  it  was  a  word  of 
tenderness  and  sympathy  about  my  brother's 
trial ;  it  was  womanly,  tender,  and  sweet,  such 
as  at  heart  you  are.  After  all,  my  love  of  you 
is  greater  than  my  admiration,  for  I  think  it 
more  and  better  to  be  really  a  woman  worth 
loving  than  to  have  read  Greek  and  German 
and  written  books.  .  .  . 

It  seems  now  but  a  little  while  since  my 
brother  Henry  and  I  were  two  young  people 
together.  He  was  my  two  years  junior,  and 
nearest  companion  out  of  seven  brothers  and 
three  sisters.  I  taught  him  drawing  and  heard 
his  Latin  lessons,  for  you  know  a  girl  becomes 
mature  and  womanly  long  before  a  boy.  .  .  . 
Then  he  married  and  lived  a  missionary  life  in 
the  new  West,  all  with  a  joyousness,  an  enthu 
siasm,  a  chivalry,  which  made  life  bright  and 
vigorous  to  us  both.  Then  in  time  he  was 
called  to  Brooklyn.  ...  I  well  remember  one 
snowy  night  his  riding  till  midnight  to  see  me, 
and  then  our  talking,  till  near  morning,  what 


DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE  213 

we  could  do  to  make  headway  against  the  hor 
rid  cruelties  that  were  being  practiced  against 
the  defenseless  blacks.  My  husband  was  then 
away  lecturing,  and  my  heart  was  burning  it 
self  out  in  indignation  and  anguish.  Henry 
told  me  he  meant  to  fight  that  battle  in  New 
York  ;  that  he  would  have  a  church  that  would 
stand  by  him  to  resist  the  tyrannic  dictation  of 
Southern  slaveholders.  I  said  :  "  I,  too,  have 
begun  to  do  something  ;  I  have  begun  a  story, 
trying  to  set  forth  the  sufferings  and  wrongs 
of  the  slaves."  " That's  right,  Hattie,"  he 
said  ;  "  finish  it,  and  I  will  scatter  it  thick  as 
the  leaves  of  Vallombrosa," — and  so  came 
"  Uncle  Tom,"  and  Plymouth  Church  became 
a  stronghold.  .  .  . 

And  when  all  was  over,  it  was  he  and  Lloyd 
Garrison  who  were  sent  by  government  once 
more  to  raise  our  national  flag  on  Fort  Sumter. 
You  must  see  that  a  man  does  not  so  energize 
without  making  many  enemies.  Half  of  our 
Union  has  been  defeated  .  .  .  and  there  are 
those  who  never  saw  our  faces  that  to  this 
hour  hate  him  and  me.  Then  he  has  been  a 
progressive  in  theology.  He  has  been  a  student 
of  Huxley  and  Spencer  and  Darwin,  —  enough 
to  alarm  the  old  school,  —  and  yet  remained  so 
ardent  a  supernaturalist  as  equally  to  repel  the 
radical  destructionists  in  religion.  He  and  I  are 
Christ-worshipers,  adoring  Him  as  the  Image  in 
the  Invisible  God  and  all  that  comes  from  be- 


214  DAYS   WITH    MRS.   STOWE 

lieving  this.  Then  he  has  been  a  reformer, 
an  advocate  of  universal  suffrage  and  woman's 
rights,  yet  not  radical  enough  to  please  that 
reform  party  who  stand  where  the  socialists  of 
France  do,  and  are  for  tearing  up  all  creation 
generally.  Lastly,  he  had  had  the  misfortune 
of  a  popularity  which  is  perfectly  phenomenal. 
I  cannot  give  you  any  idea  of  the  love,  worship, 
idolatry,  with  which  he  has  been  overwhelmed. 
He  has  something  magnetic  about  him,  that 
makes  everybody  crave  his  society,  that  .makes 
men  follow  and  worship  him.  .  .  . 

My  brother  is  hopelessly  generous  and  con 
fiding.  His  inability  to  believe  evil  is  some 
thing  incredible,  and  so  has  come  all  this  suffer 
ing.  .  .  .  But  you  see  why  I  have  not  written. 
This  has  drawn  on  my  life,  —  my  heart's  blood. 
He  is  myself  ;  I  know  you  are  the  kind  of 
woman  to  understand  me  when  I  say  I  felt  a 
blow  at  him  more  than  at  myself.  I  who  know 
his  purity,  honor,  delicacy,  know  that  he  has 
been  from  childhood  of  an  ideal  purity,  —  who 
reverenced  his  conscience  as  his  king,  whose 
glory  was  redressing  human  wrong,  who  spoke 
no  slander,  no,  nor  listened  to  it.  ...  My 
brother's  power  to  console  is  something  pecu 
liar  and  wonderful.  I  have  seen  him  at  death 
beds  and  funerals,  where  it  would  seem  as  if 
hope  herself  must  be  dumb,  bring  down  the 
very  peace  of  Heaven  and  change  despair  to 
trust.  He  has  not  had  less  power  in  his  own 
adversity.  .  .  . 


DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE  215 

Well,  dear,  pardon  me  for  this  outpour.  I 
loved  you,  —  I  love  you,  —  and  therefore 
wanted  you  to  know  just  what  I  felt.  .  .  . 

This  friendship  was  one  that  greatly  en 
listed  Mrs.  Stowe's  sympathies  and  enriched  her 
life.  Her  interest  in  any  woman  who  was  sup 
porting  herself,  and  especially  in  any  one  who 
found  a  daily  taskmaster  in  the  pen,  and  above 
all  when,  as  in  this  case,  the  woman  was  one 
possessed  of  great  moral  aspiration  half  para 
lyzed  in  its  action  because  she  found  herself  in 
an  anomalous  and  (to  the  world  in  general) 
utterly  incomprehensible  position,  made  such 
a  woman  like  a  magnet  to  Mrs.  Stowe.  She 
inherited  from  her  father  a  faith  in  the  divine 
power  of  sympathy,  which  only  waxed  greater 
with  years  and  experience.  Wherever  she  found 
a  fellow-mortal  suffering  trouble  or  dishonor,  in 
spite  of  hindrance  her  feet  were  turned  that 
way.  The  genius  of  George  Eliot  and  the  con 
trasting  elements  of  her  life  and  character  drew 
Mrs.  Stowe  to  her  side  in  sisterly  solicitude. 
Her  attitude,  her  sweetness,  her  sincerity,  could 
not  fail  to  win  the  heart  of  George  Eliot.  They 
became  loving  friends. 

It  was  the  same  inborn  sense  of  fraternity 
which  led  her,  when  a  child,  on  hearing  of  the 
death  of  Lord  Byron,  to  go  out  into  the  fields 
and  fling  herself,  weeping,  on  the  mounded 
hay,  where  she  might  pray  alone  for  his  forgive- 


216  DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE 

ness  and  salvation.  It  is  wonderful  to  observe 
the  influence  of  Byron  upon  that  generation. 
It  is  on  record  that  when  Tennyson,  a  boy  of 
fifteen,  heard  some  one  say,  "  Byron  is  dead," 
he  thought  the  whole  world  at  an  end.  "  I 
thought,"  he  said  one  day,  "  everything  was 
over  and  finished  for  every  one ;  that  nothing 
else  mattered.  I  remember  that  I  went  out 
alone  and  carved  *  Byron  is  dead '  into  the  sand 
stone." 

From  this  time  forward  Mrs.  Stowe  was 
chiefly  bound  up  in  her  life  and  labors  at  the 
South.  In  1870,  speaking  of  some  literary 
work  she  was  proposing  to  herself,  she  said  : 
"  I  am  writing  as  a  pure  recreative  movement 
of  mind,  to  divert  myself  from  the  stormy,  un- 
restful  present.  ...  I  am  being  chatelaine  of  a 
Florida  farm.  I  have  on  my  mind  the  creation 
of  a  town  on  the  banks  of  the  St.  John.  The 
three  years  since  we  came  this  side  of  the  river 
have  called  into  life  and  growth  a  thousand 
peach-trees,  a  thousand  orange-trees,  about  five 
hundred  lemons,  and  seven  or  eight  hundred 
grapevines.  A  peach  orchard,  a  vineyard,  a 
lemon  grove,  will  carry  my  name  to  posterity. 
I  am  founding  a  place  which,  thirty  or  forty 
years  hence,  will  be  called  the  old  Stowe  place. 
.  .  .  You  can  have  no  idea  of  this  queer  coun 
try,  this  sort  of  strange,  sandy,  half  -  tropical 
dreamland,  unless  you  come  to  it.  Here  I  sit 
with  open  windows,  the  orange  buds  just  open- 


DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE  217 

ing  and  filling  the  air  with  sweetness,  the  hens 
drowsily  cackling,  the  men  planting  in  the  field, 
and  callas  and  wild  roses  blossoming  out  of 
doors.  We  keep  a  little  fire  morning  and  night. 
We  are  flooded  with  birds ;  and  by  the  bye,  it 
is  St.  Valentine's  Day.  ...  I  think  a  uniform  1 
edition  of  Dr.  Holmes's  works  would  be  a  good 
thing.  Next  to  Hawthorne  he  is  our  most  ex 
quisite  writer,  and  in  many  passages  he  goes  j 
far  beyond  him.  What  is  the  dear  Doctor 
doing  ?  If  you  know  any  book  good  to  inspire 
dreams  and  visions,  put  it  into  my  box.  My 
husband  chews  endlessly  a  German  cud.  I 
must  have  English.  Has  the  French  book 
on  Spiritualism  come  yet  ?  If  it  has,  put  it  in. 
...  I  wish  I  could  give  you  a  plateful  of  our 
oranges.  .  .  .  We  had  seventy  -  five  thousand 
of  these  same  on  our  trees  this  year,  and  if 
you  will  start  off  quick,  they  are  not  all  picked 
yet.  Florida  wants  one  thing,  —  grass.  If  it 
had  grass,  it  would  be  paradise.  But  nobody 
knows  what  grass  is  till  they  try  to  do  with 
out  it." 

Three  months  later  she  wrote :  "  I  hate  to 
leave  my  calm  isle  of  Patmos,  where  the  world 
is  not,  and  I  have  such  quiet  long  hours  for 
writing.  Emerson  could  insulate  himself  here 
and  keep  his  electricity.  Hawthorne  ought  to 
have  lived  in  an  orange  grove  in  Florida.  .  .  . 
You  have  no  idea  how  small  you  all  look,  you 
folks  in  the  world,  from  this  distance.  All  your 


218  DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE 

fusses  and  your  fumings,  your  red-hot  hurrying 
newspapers,  your  clamor  of  rival  magazines,  — 
why,  we  see  it  as  we  see  steamboats  fifteen 
miles  off,  a  mere  speck  and  smoke.'* 

Again  she  writes  :  "  You  ought  to  see  us 
riding  out  in  our  mule-cart.  Poor  '  Fly  ! '  the 
last  of  pea-time,  who  looks  like  an  animated 
hair-trunk  and  the  wagon  and  harness  to  match  ! 
It  is  too  funny,  but  we  enjoy  it  hugely.  There 
are  now  in  our  solitude  five  Northern  families, 
and  we  manage  to  have  quite  pleasant  society. 

"But  think  of  our  church  and  school-house 
being  burned  down  just  as  we  were  ready  to  do 
something  with  it.  I  feel  it  most  for  the  col 
ored  people,  who  were  so  anxious  to  have  their 
school  and  now  have  no  place  to  have  it  in. 
We  have  all  been  trying  to  raise  what  we  can 
for  a  new  building  and  intend  to  get  one  up  by 
March. 

"  If  I  were  North  now  I  would  try  giving 
some  readings  for  this  and  perhaps  raise  some 
thing." 

It  was  a  strange  contrast  and  one  at  variance 
with  her  natural  taste,  which  brought  her  be 
fore  the  public  as  a  reader  of  her  own  stories  in 
the  autumn  and  winter  of  1872-73.  She  was  no 
longer  able  to  venture  on  the  effort  of  a  long 
story,  and  yet  it  was  manifestly  unwise  for  her 
to  forego  the  income  which  was  extended  to 
her  through  this  channel.  She  wrote  :  "  I  have 
had  a  very  urgent  business  letter,  saying  that 


DAYS   WITH    MRS.   STOWE  219 

the  lyceums  of  different  towns  were  making  up 
their  engagements,  and  that  if  I  were  going 
into  it  I  must  make  my  engagements  now.  It 
seems  to  me  that  I  cannot  do  this.  The  thing 
will  depend  so  much  on  my  health  and  ability 
to  do.  You  know  I  could  not  go  round  in  cold 
weather.  ...  I  feel  entirely  uncertain,  and,  as 
the  Yankees  say,  '  did  n't  know  what  to  do  nor 
to  don't.'  My  state  in  regard  to  it  may  be  de 
scribed  by  the  phrase  '  Kind  o'  love  to  —  hate 
to — wish  I  didn't  —  want  ter.'  I  suppose  the 
result  will  be  I  shall  not  work  into  their  lecture 
system." 

In  April  she  wrote  from  Mandarin  :  "  I  am 
painting  a  Magnolia  grandiflora,  which  I  will 
show  you.  ...  I  am  appalled  by  finding  my 
self  booked  to  read.  But  I  am  getting  well  and 
strong,  and  trust  to  be  equal  to  the  emergency. 

But  I  shrink  from  Tremont  Temple,  and 

does  not  think  I  can  fill  it.  On  the  whole 
I  should  like  to  begin  in  Boston."  And  in 
August  she  said :  "  I  am  to  begin  in  Boston  in 
September.  ...  It  seems  to  me  that  is  a  little 
too  early  for  Boston,  is  n't  it  ?  Will  there  be 
anybody  in  town  then  ?  I  don't  know  as  it 's 
my  business,  which  is  simply  to  speak  my  piece 
and  take  my  money." 

Her  first  reading  actually  took  place  in 
Springfield,  not  Boston,  and  the  next  day  she 
unexpectedly  arrived  at  our  cottage  at  Man- 
chester-by-the-Sea.  She  had  read  the  previous 


220  DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE 

evening  in  a  large  public  hall,  had  risen  at  five 
o'clock  that  morning,  and  found  her  way  to  us. 
Her  next  readings  were  given  in  Boston,  the 
first,  in  the  afternoon,  at  the  Tremont  Temple. 
She  was  conscious  that  her  effort  at  Springfield 
had  not  been  altogether  successful,  —  she  had 
not  held  her  large  audience ;  and  she  was  de 
termined  to  put  the  whole  force  of  her  nature 
into  this  afternoon  reading  at  the  Tremont 
Temple.  She  called  me  into  her  bedroom, 
where  she  stood  before  the  mirror,  with  her 
short  gray  hair,  which  usually  lay  in  soft  curls 
around  her  brow,  brushed  erect  and  standing 
stiffly.  "  Look  here,  my  dear,"  she  said  ;  "  now 
I  am  exactly  like  my  father,  Dr.  Lyman 
Beecher,  when  he  was  going  to  preach,"  and 
she  held  up  her  forefinger  warningly.  It  was 
easy  to  see  that  the  spirit  of  the  old  preacher 
was  revived  in  her  veins,  and  the  afternoon 
would  show  something  of  his  power.  An  hour 
later,  when  I  sat  with  her  in  the  anteroom  wait 
ing  for  the  moment  of  her  appearance  to  arrive, 
I  could  feel  the  power  surging  up  within  her. 
I  knew  she  was  armed  for  a  good  fight. 

That  reading  was  a  great  success.  She  was 
alive  in  every  fibre  of  her  being  :  she  was  to 
read  portions  of  "  Uncle  Tom's  Cabin  "  to  men, 
women,  and  children  many  of  whom  had  taken 
no  part  in  the  crisis  which  inspired  it,  and  she 
determined  to  effect  the  difficult  task  of  making 
them  feel  as  well  as  hear.  With  her  presence 


DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE  221 

and  inspiration  they  could  not  fail  to  under 
stand  what  her  words  had  signified  to  the  gen 
eration  that  had  passed  through  the  struggle  of 
our  war.  When  her  voice  was  not  sufficient  to 
make  the  audience  hear,  the  people  rose  from 
their  seats  and  crowded  round  her,  standing 
gladly,  that  no  word  might  be  lost.  It  was  the 
last  leap  of  the  flame  which  had  burned  out 
a  great  wrong.  From  this  period,  although  she 
continued  to  write,  she  lived  chiefly  for  several 
winters  in  the  retirement  of  the  Florida  orange 
grove,  which  she  always  enjoyed.  Her  sym 
pathy  was  strong  with  the  new  impetus  benevo 
lent  work  in  cities  had  received,  and  she  helped 
it  from  her  "  grotto  "  in  more  ways  than  one. 
Sometimes  she  would  write  soothing  or  inspirit 
ing  letters,  as  the  case  might  demand,  to  indi 
viduals. 

The  following  note,  written  at  the  time  of 
the  Boston  fire  in  1872,  will  show  how  alive  she 
was  to  the  need  of  that  period. 

"  I  send  inclosed  one  hundred  dollars  to  the 
fund  for  the  Firemen.  I  could  wish  it  a  hun 
dred  times  as  much,  and  then  it  would  be  in 
adequate  to  express  how  much  I  honor  those 
brave,  devoted  men  who  put  their  own  lives  be 
tween  Boston  and  mine.  No  soldiers  that  fell 
in  battle  for  our  common  country  ever  deserved 
of  us  all  greater  honor  than  the  noble  men 
whose  charred  and  blackened  remains  have 
been  borne  from  the  ruins  of  Boston  ;  they  are 


222  DAYS   WITH    MRS.   STOWE 

worthy  to  be  inscribed  on  imperishable  monu 
ments. 

"  I  would  that  some  such  honorary  memorial 
might  commemorate  their  heroism." 

Meanwhile,  the  comfort  she  drew  in  from 
the  beauty  of  nature  and  the  calm  around  her 
seemed  yearly  to  nourish  and  renew  her  power 
of  existence.  Questions  which  were  difficult 
to  others  were  often  solved  to  her  mind  by 
practical  observation.  It  amused  her  to  hear 
persons  agitating  the  question  as  to  where  they 
should  look  to  supply  labor  for  the  South. 
"Why,"  she  remarked  once,  "there  was  a 
negro,  one  of  those  fearfully  hot  days  in  the 
spring,  who  was  digging  muck  from  a  swamp 
just  in  front  of  our  house,  and  carrying  it  in  a 
wheelbarrow  up  a  steep  slope,  where  he  dumped 
it  down,  and  then  went  back  for  more.  He 
kept  this  up  when  it  was  so  hot  that  we  thought 
either  one  of  us  would  die  to  be  five  minutes 
in  the  sun.  We  carried  a  thermometer  to  the 
spot  where  he  was  working,  to  see  how  great 
the  heat  was,  and  it  rose  at  once  to  one  hun 
dred  and  thirty-five  degrees.  The  man,  how 
ever,  kept  cheerfully  at  his  work,  and  when  he 
went  to  his  dinner  sat  with  the  other  negroes 
out  in  the  white  sand  without  a  bit  of  shade. 
Afterward  they  all  lay  down  for  a  nap  in  the 
same  unsheltered  locality.  Toward  evening, 
when  the  sun  was  sufficiently  low  to  enable  me 
to  go  out,  I  went  to  speak  to  this  man.  *  Martin/ 


DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE  223 

said  I,  'you've  had  a  warm  day's  work.  How 
do  you  stand  it  ?  Why,  I  could  n't  endure 
such  heat  for  five  minutes.'  'Hoh  !  hoh  !  No, 
I  s'pose  you  couldn't.  Ladies  can't,  missus.' 
'  But,  Martin,  are  n't  you  very  tired  ? '  '  Bress 
your  heart,  no,  missus.'  So  Martin  goes  home 
to  his  supper,  and  after  supper  will  be  found 
dancing  all  the  evening  on  the  wharf  near  by  ! 
After  this,  when  people  talk  of  bringing  Ger 
mans  and  Swedes  to  do  such  work,  I  am  much 
entertained." 

Many  were  the  pleasant  descriptions  of  her 
home  sent  forth  to  tempt  her  friends  away 
from  the  busy  North.  "  Here  is  where  we  read 
books,"  she  said  in  one  of  her  letters,  written 
in  the  month  of  March.  "  Up  North  nobody 

does,  —  they  don't  have  time  ;    so  if will 

mail  his  book  to  Mandarin,  I  will  'read,  mark, 
learn,  and  inwardly  digest.'  We  are  having  a 
carnival  of  flowers.  I  hope  you  read  my  '  Pal 
metto  Leaves,'  for  then  you  will  see  all  about 
us.  ...  Our  home  is  like  a  martin-box.  ...  I 
cannot  tell  you  the  quaint  odd  peace  we  have 
here  in  living  under  the  oak.  '  Behold,  she 
dwelleth  under  the  oak  at  Mamre.'  All  that  we 
want  is  friends,  to  whom  we  may  say  that  soli 
tude  is  sweet.  We  have  some  neighbors,  how 
ever,  who  have  made  pretty  places  near  us. 
Mr.  Stowe  keeps  up  a  German  class  of  three 
young  ladies,  with  whom  he  is  reading  Faust 
for  the  nine  hundred  and  ninety-ninth  time,  and 


224  DAYS   WITH    MRS.   STOWE 

in  the  evening  I  read  aloud  to  a  small  party  of 
the  neighbors.  We  have  made  up  our  home  as 
we  went  along,  throwing  out  a  chamber  here 
and  there,  like  twigs  out  of  the  old  oak.  .  .  . 
The  orange  blossoms  have  come  like  showers 
of  pearl,  and  the  yellow  jessamine  like  golden 
fleeces,  and  the  violets  and  the  lilies,  and 
azaleas.  This  is  glorious,  budding,  blossoming 
spring,  and  we  have  days  when  merely  to 
breathe  and  be  is  to  be  blessed.  I  love  to  have 
a  day  of  mere  existence.  Life  itself  is  a -pleas 
ure  when  the  sun  shines  warm,  and  the  lizards 
dart  from  all  the  shingles  of  the  roof,  and  the 
birds  sing  in  so  many  notes  and  tones  the  yard 
reverberates ;  and  I  sit  and  dream  and  am 
happy,  and  never  want  to  go  back  North,  nor 
do  anything  with  the  toiling,  snarling  world 
again.  I  do  wish  I  could  gather  you  both  in 
my  little  nest." 

She  was  like  her  father,  Dr.  Lyman  Beecher, 
in  many  things.  The  scorching  fire  of  the 
brain  seemed  to  devour  its  essence,  and  she 
endured,  as  he  did  before  her,  some  years  of 
existence  when  the  motive  power  almost  ceased 
to  act.  She  became  "like  a  little  child," 
wandering  about,  pleased  with  flowers,  fresh 
air,  the  sound  of  a  piano,  or  a  voice  singing 
hymns,  but  the  busy,  inspiring  spirit  was 
asleep. 

Gradually  she  faded  away,  shrouded  in  this 
strange  mystery,  hovered  over  by  the  untiring 


DAYS   WITH   MRS.   STOWE  225 

affection  of  her  children,  sweet  and  tender  in 
her  decadence,  but  "absent." 

At  the  moment  when  this  brief  memorial 
was  receiving  a  final  revision  before  going  to 
the  press,  the  news  reached  me  of  the  unloos 
ing  of  the  last  threads  of  consciousness  which 
bound  Mrs.  Stowe  to  this  world. 

The  sweetness  and  patience  of  her  waiting 
years  can  only  be  perfectly  told  by  the  daugh 
ters  who  hung  over  her.  She  knew  her  con 
dition,  but  there  was  never  a  word  of  complaint, 
and  so  long  as  her  husband  lived  she  performed 
the  office  of  nurse  and  attendant  upon  his  light 
est  wishes  as  if  she  felt  herself  strong.  Her 
near  friends  were  sometimes  invited  to  dine  or 
to  have  supper  with  her  at  that  period,  but  they 
could  see  even  then  how  prostrated  she  became 
after  the  slightest  mental  effort.  It  was  upon 
occasion  of  such  a  visit  that  she  told  me,  with  a 
twinkle  of  the  eye,  that  "  Mr.  Stowe  was  some 
times  inclined  to  be  a  little  fretful  during  the 
long  period  of  his  illness,  and  said  to  her  one 
day  that  he  believed  the  Lord  had  forgotten 
him."  "Oh,  no,  He  hasn't,"  she  answered; 
"  cheer  up !  your  turn  will  come  soon." 

She  was  always  fond  of  music,  especially  of 
the  one  kind  she  had  known  best ;  and  the  sing 
ing  of  hymns  never  failed  to  soothe  her  at  the 
last ;  therefore  when  the  little  group  stood 
round  her  open  grave  on  a  lovely  July  day  and 
sang  quite  simply  the  hymns  she  loved,  it  seemed 


226  DAYS   WITH    MRS.   STOWE 

in  its  simplicity  and  broken  harmony  a  fitting 
farewell  to  the  faded  body  she  had  already  left 
so  far  behind. 

A  great  spirit  has  performed  its  mission  and 
has  been  released.  The  world  moves  on  un 
conscious  ;  but  the  world's  children  have  been 
blessed  by  her  coming,  and  they  who  know  and 
understand  should  praise  God  reverently  in  her 
going.  "  As  a  teil  tree,  and  as  an  oak,  whose 
substance  is  in  them,  when  they  cast  their 
leaves  :  so  the  holy  seed  shall  be  the  substance 
thereof."  In  the  words  of  the  prophet  we  can 
almost  hear  her  glad  cry  :  — 

"  My  sword  shall  be  bathed  in  heaven." 


CELIA   THAXTER 

BORN  JUNE,   1835;   DIED   AUGUST,   1894. 


CELIA  THAXTER 

IF  it  were  ever  intended  that  a  desolate  island 
in  the  deep  sea  should  be  inhabited  by  one  sol 
itary  family,  then  indeed  Celia  Thaxter  was 
the  fitting  daughter  of  such  a  house. 

In  her  history  of  the  group  of  islands,  which 
she  calls  "  Among  the  Isles  of  Shoals,"  she  por 
trays,  in  a  prose  which  for  beauty  and  wealth 
of  diction  has  few  rivals,  the  unfolding  of  her 
own  nature  under  influences  of  sky  and  sea 
and  solitude  and  untrammeled  freedom,  such 
as  have  been  almost  unknown  to  civilized  hu 
manity  in  any  age  of  the  world.  She  speaks 
also  of  the  effect  produced,  as  she  fancied,  upon 
the  minds  of  men  by  the  eternal  sound  of  the 
sea :  a  tendency  to  wear  away  the  edge  of 
human  thought  and  perception.  But  this  was 
far  from  being  the  case  with  regard  to  herself. 
Her  eyesight  was  keener,  her  speech  more  dis 
tinct,  the  lines  of  her  thoughts  more  clearly 
defined,  her  verse  more  strongly  marked  in  its 
form,  and  the  accuracy  of  her  memory  more  to 
be  relied  upon  than  was  the  case  with  almost 
any  one  of  her  contemporaries.  Her  painting, 
too,  upon  porcelain  possessed  the  same  charac- 


230  CELIA  THAXTER 

ten  Her  knowledge  of  the  flowers,  and  espe 
cially  of  the  seaweeds,  with  which  she  decorated 
it,  was  so  exact  that  she  did  not  require  the 
originals  before  her  vision.  They  were  painted 
upon  her  mind's  eye,  where  every  filament  and 
every  shade  seemed  to  be  recorded.  These 
green  "  growing  things  "  had  been  the  beloved 
companions  of  her  childhood,  as  they  continued 
to  be  of  her  womanhood,  and  even  to  repro 
duce  their  forms  in  painting  was  a  delight  to 
her.  The  written  descriptions  of  natural  ob 
jects  give  her  history  a  place  among  the  pages 
which  possess  a  perennial  existence.  While 
White's  "  Selborne,"  and  the  pictures  of  Be 
wick,  and  Thoreau's  "  Walden,"  and  the  "  Auto 
biography  of  Richard  Jefferies  "  endure,  so  long 
will  "Among  the  Isles  of  Shoals"  hold  its 
place  with  all  lovers  of  nature.  She  says  in 
one  place,  "All  the  pictures  over  which  I 
dream  are  set  in  this  framework  of  the  sea, 
that  sparkled  and  sang,  or  frowned  and  threat 
ened,  in  the  ages  that  are  gone  as  it  does 
to-day." 

The  solitude  of  Celia  Thaxter's  childhood, 
which  was  not  solitude,  surrounded  as  she  was 
with  the  love  of  a  father  and  a  mother,  all  ten 
derness,  and  brothers  dear  to  her  as  her  own 
life,  developed  in  the  child  strange  faculties. 
She  was  five  years  old  when  the  family  left 
Portsmouth,  —  old  enough,  given  her  inborn 
power  of  enjoyment  of  nature,  to  delight  in  the 


CELIA   THAXTER  231 

free  air  and  the  wonderful  sights  around  her. 
She  gives  in  her  book  a  pretty  picture  of  the 
child  watching  the  birds  that  flew  against 
the  lighthouse  lantern,  when  they  lived  at 
White  Island.  The  birds  would  strike  it  with 
such  force  as  to  kill  themselves.  "  Many  a  May 
morning,"  she  says,  "have  I  wandered  about 
the  rock  at  the  foot  of  the  tower,  mourning  over 
a  little  apron  brimful  of  sparrows,  swallows, 
thrushes,  robins,  fire-winged  blackbirds,  many- 
colored  warblers  and  flycatchers,  beautifully 
clothed  yellow-birds,  nuthatches,  catbirds,  even 
the  purple  finch  and  scarlet  tanager  and  golden 
oriole,  and  many  more  beside,  — enough  to 
break  the  heart  of  a  small  child  to  think  of ! 
Once  a  great  eagle  flew  against  the  lantern  and 
shivered  the  glass." 

Her  father  seems  to  have  been  a  man  of  awful 
energy  of  will.  Some  disappointment  in  his 
hope  of  a  public  career,  it  has  been  said,  de 
cided  him  to  take  the  step  of  withdrawing  him 
self  forever  from  the  world  of  the  mainland, 
and  this  attitude  he  appears  to  have  sustained 
unflinchingly  to  the  end.  Her  mother,  with  a 
heart  stayed  as  unflinchingly  upon  love  and 
obedience,  seems  to  have  followed  him  without 
a  murmur,  leaving  every  dear  association  of  the 
past  as  though  it  had  not  been.  From  this  mo 
ment  she  became,  not  the  slave,  but  the  queen 
of  her  affections;  and  when  she  died,  in  1877, 
the  sun  appeared  to  set  upon  her  daughter's 


232  CELIA   THAXTER 

life.  On  the  morning  after  Mrs.  Thaxter's 
sudden  death,  seventeen  years  later,  a  friend 
asked  her  eldest  son  where  his  mother  was, 
with  the  intent  to  discover  if  she  had  been  well 
enough  to  leave  her  room.  "  Oh,"  he  replied, 
"her  mother  came  in  the  night  and  took  her 
away."  This  reply  showed  how  deeply  all  who 
were  near  to  Celia  Thaxter  were  impressed  with 
the  fact  that  to  see  her  mother  again  was  one 
of  the  deepest  desires  of  her  heart. 

The  development  wrought  in  her  eager  char 
acter  by  those  early  days  of  exceptional  ex 
perience  gives  a  new  sense  of  what  our  poor 
humanity  may  achieve,  left  face  to  face  with 
the  vast  powers  of  nature. 

In  speaking  of  the  energy  of  Samuel  Haley, 
one  of  the  early  settlers  of  the  islands,  she  says 
he  learned  to  live  as  independently  as  possible 
of  his  fellow-men  ;  "  for  that  is  one  of  the  first 
things  a  settler  on  the  Isles  of  Shoals  finds  it 
necessary  to  learn."  Her  own  lesson  was  learned 
perfectly.  The  sunrise  was  as  familiar  to  her 
eyes  as  the  sunset,  and  early  and  late  the  ac 
tivity  of  her  mind  was  rivaled  by  the  ceaseless 
industry  of  her  hands.  She  pays  a  tribute  to 
the  memory  of  Miss  Peabody,  of  Newburyport, 
who  went  to  Star  Island  in  1823  and  "did  won 
ders  for  the  people  during  the  three  years  of 
her  stay.  She  taught  the  school,  visited  the 
families,  and  on  Sundays  read  to  such  audiences 
as  she  could  collect,  took  seven  of  the  poor 


CELIA  THAXTER  233 

female  children  to  live  with  her  at  the  parson 
age,  instructed  all  who  would  learn  in  the  arts 
of  carding,  spinning,  weaving,  knitting,  sewing, 
braiding  mats,  etc.  Truly  she  remembered 
what  '  Satan  finds  for  idle  hands  to  do,'  and 
kept  all  her  charges  busy,  and  consequently 
happy.  All  honor  to  her  memory !  She  was 
a  wise  and  faithful  servant.  There  is  still 
an  affectionate  remembrance  of  her  among 
the  present  inhabitants,  whose  mothers  she 
helped  out  of  their  degradation  into  a  better 
life." 

If  it  was  not  in  Celia  Thaxter's  nature  to 
teach  in  this  direct  way  herself,  she  did  not  fail 
to  appreciate  and  to  stimulate  excellence  of 
every  kind  in  others.  Appledore  was  too  far 
away  in  winter  from  the  village  at  Star  Island 
for  any  regular  or  frequent  communication  be 
tween  them.  Even  so  late  as  in  the  month  of 
May  she  records  watching  a  little  fleet  beating 
up  for  shelter  under  the  lee  of  Appledore  to  ride 
out  a  storm.  "They  were  in  continual  peril. 
...  It  was  not  pleasant  to  watch  them  as  the 
early  twilight  shut  down  over  the  vast  weltering 
desolation  of  the  sea,  to  see  the  slender  masts 
waving  helplessly  from  one  side  to  another. 
.  .  .  Some  of  the  men  had  wives  and  children 
watching  them  from  lighted  windows  at  Star. 
What  a  fearful  night  for  them !  They  could 
not  tell  from  hour  to  hour,  through  the  thick 
darkness,  if  yet  the  cables  held  ;  they  could  not 


234  CELIA  THAXTER 

see  till  daybreak  whether  the  sea  had  swallowed 
up  their  treasures.  I  wonder  the  wives  were 
not  white  haired  when  the  sun  rose  and  showed 
them  those  little  specks  yet  rolling  in  the 
breakers  !  "  How  clearly  these  scenes  were 
photographed  on  the  sensitive  plate  of  her  mind ! 
She  never  forgot  nor  really  lost  sight  of  her 
island  people.  Her  sympathy  drew  them  to 
her  as  if  they  were  her  own,  and  the  little 
colony  of  Norwegians  was  always  especially 
dear  to  her.  "  How  pathetic,"  she  says,  •"  the 
gathering  of  women  on  the  headlands,  when  out 
of  the  sky  swept  the  squall  that  sent  the  small 
boat  staggering  before  it,  and  blinded  the  eyes, 
already  drowned  in  tears,  with  sudden  rain  that 
hid  sky  and  sea  and  boats  from  their  eager 
gaze ! " 

What  she  was,  what  her  sympathy  was,  to 
those  people,  no  one  can  ever  quite  express. 
The  deep  devotion  of  their  service  to  her 
brothers  and  to  herself,  through  the  long  soli 
tude  of  winter  and  the  storm  of  summer  visi 
tors,  alone  could  testify.  Such  service  cannot 
be  bought :  it  is  the  devotion  born  of  affection 
and  gratitude  and  admiration.  Speaking  of  one 
of  the  young  women  who  grew  up  under  her 
eye,  she  often  said  :  "  What  could  I  do  in  this 
world  without  Mine  Burntssen  ?  I  hope  she 
will  be  with  me  when  I  die."  And  there  indeed, 
at  the  last,  was  Mine,  to  receive  the  latest  word 
and  to  perform  the  few  sad  offices. 


CELIA   THAXTER  235 

To  tell  of  the  services  Mrs.  Thaxter  rendered 
to  some  of  the  more  helpless  people  about  her, 
in  the  dark  season,  when  no  assistance  from  the 
mainland  could  be  hoped  for,  would  make  a 
long  and  noble  story  in  itself.  Her  good  sense 
made  her  an  excellent  doctor ;  the  remedies  she 
understood  she  was  always  on  hand  to  apply  at 
the  right  moment.  Sometimes  she  was  unex 
pectedly  called  to  assist  in  the  birth  of  a  child, 
when  knowledge  and  strength  she  was  hardly 
aware  of  seemed  to  be  suddenly  developed. 
But  the  truth  was  she  could  do  almost  any 
thing  ;  and  only  those  who  knew  her  in  these 
humbler  human  relations  could  understand  how 
joyous  she  was  in  the  exercise  of  such  duties, 
or  how  well  able  to  perform  them.  Writing  to 
Mine  from  the  Shoals  once  in  March,  she  says  : 
"  This  is  the  time  to  be  here ;  this  is  what  I 
enjoy!  To  wear  my  old  clothes  every  day, 
grub  in  the  ground,  dig  dandelions  and  eat  them 
too,  plant  my  seeds  and  watch  them,  fly  on  the 
tricycle,  row  in  a  boat,  get  into  my  dressing- 
gown  right  after  tea,  and  make  lovely  rag  rugs 
all  the  evening,  and  nobody  to  disturb  us, — 
this  is  fun  !  "  In  the  house  and  out  of  it  she 
was  capable  of  everything.  How  beautiful  her 
skill  was  as  a  dressmaker,  the  exquisite  lines  in 
her  own  black  or  gray  or  white  dresses  testified 
to  every  one  who  ever  saw  her.  She  never  wore 
any  other  colors,  nor  was  anything  like  "  trim 
ming  "  ever  seen  about  her;  there  were  only 


236  CELIA   THAXTER 

the  fine,  free  outlines,  and  a  white  handkerchief 
folded  carefully  about  her  neck  and  shoulders. 
In  her  young  days  it  was  the  same,  with  a 
difference !  She  was  slighter  in  figure  then, 
and  overflowing  with  laughter,  the  really  beau 
tiful  but  noisy  laughter  which  died  away  as  the 
repose  of  manner  of  later  years  fell  upon  her. 
I  can  remember  her  as  I  first  saw  her,  with  the 
seashells  which  she  always  wore  then  around  her 
neck  and  wrists,  and  a  gray  poplin  dress  defin 
ing  her  lovely  form.  She  talked  simply  and  fear 
lessly,  while  her  keen  eyes  took  in  everything 
around  her  ;  she  paid  the  tribute  of  her  instan 
taneous  laughter  to  the  wit  of  others, — never 
too  eager  to  speak,  and  never  unwilling.  Her 
sense  of  beauty,  not  vanity,  caused  her  to  make 
the  most  of  the  good  physical  points  she  pos 
sessed  ;  therefore,  although  she  grew  old  early, 
the  same  general  features  of  her  appearance 
were  preserved.  She  was  almost  too  well  known 
even  to  strangers,  in  these  later  years  at  the 
Shoals,  to  make  it  worth  while  to  describe  the 
white  hair  carefully  put  up  to  preserve  the  shape 
of  the  head,  and  the  small  silver  crescent  which 
she  wore  above  her  forehead ;  but  her  manner 
had  become  very  quiet  and  tender,  more  and 
more  affectionate  to  her  friends,  and  apprecia 
tive  of  all  men.  One  of  those  who  knew  her 
latterly  wrote  me  :  "  Many  of  her  letters  show 
her  boundless  sympathy,  her  keen  appreciation 
of  the  best  in  those  whom  she  loved,  and  her 


CELIA   THAXTER  237 

wonderful  growth  in  beauty  and  roundness  of 
character.  And  how  delightful  her  enthusi 
asms  were,  —  as  pure  and  clear  as  those  of  a 
child  !  She  was  utterly  unlike  any  one  in  the 
world,  so  that  few  people  really  understood  her. 
But  it  seems  to  me  that  her  trials  softened  and 
mellowed  her,  until  she  became  like  one  of  her 
own  beautiful  flowers,  perfect  in  her  full  devel 
opment  ;  then  in  a  night  the  petals  fell,  and  she 
was  gone." 

The  capabilities  which  were  developed  in  her 
by  the  necessities  of  the  situation,  during  her 
life  at  the  Shoals  in  winter,  were  more  various 
and  remarkable  than  can  be  fitly  told.  The 
glimpses  which  we  get  in  her  letters  of  the 
many  occupations  show  what  energy  she 
brought  to  bear  upon  the  difficulties  of  the 
place. 

In  "Among  the  Isles  of  Shoals  "  she  says  : 
"  After  winter  has  fairly  set  in,  the  lonely  dwell 
ers  at  the  Isles  of  Shoals  find  life  quite  as  much 
as  they  can  manage,  being  so  entirely  thrown 
upon  their  own  resources  that  it  requires  all  the 
philosophy  at  their  disposal  to  answer  the  de 
mand.  .  .  .  One  goes  to  sleep  in  the  muffled 
roar  of  the  storm,  and  wakes  to  find  it  still 
raging  with  senseless  fury.  .  .  .  The  weather 
becomes  of  the  first  importance  to  the  dwellers 
on  the  rock  ;  the  changes  of  the  sky  and  sea, 
the  flitting  of  the  coasters  to  and  fro,  the  visits 
of  the  sea-fowl,  sunrise  and  sunset,  the  changing 


238  CELIA  THAXTER 

moon,  the  northern  lights,  the  constellations 
that  wheel  in  splendor  through  the  winter  night, 
—  all  are  noted  with  a  love  and  careful  scrutiny 
that  is  seldom  given  by  people  living  in  popu 
lous  places.  .  .  .  For  these  things  make  our 
world  :  there  are  no  lectures,  operas,  concerts, 
theatres,  no  music  of  any  kind,  except  what  the 
waves  may  whisper  in  rarely  gentle  moods  ;  no 
galleries  of  wonders  like  the  Natural  History 
rooms,  in  which  it  is  so  fascinating  to  wander ; 
no  streets,  shops,  carriages  ;  no  postman,  no 
neighbors,  not  a  door-bell  within  the  compass  of 
the  place!  .  .  .  The  best  balanced  human  mind 
is  prone  to  lose  its  elasticity  and  stagnate,  in 
this  isolation.  One  learns  immediately  the 
value  of  work  to  keep  one's  wits  clear,  cheer 
ful,  and  steady ;  just  as  much  real  work  of  the 
body  as  it  can  bear  without  weariness  being 
always  beneficent,  but  here  indispensable.  .  .  . 
No  one  can  dream  what  a  charm  there  is  in 
taking  care  of  pets,  singing  birds,  plants,  etc., 
with  such  advantages  of  solitude ;  how  every 
leaf  and  bud  and  flower  is  pored  over,  and 
admired,  and  loved  !  A  whole  conservatory, 
flushed  with  azaleas  and  brilliant  with  forests 
of  camellias  and  every  precious  exotic  that 
blooms,  could  not  impart  so  much  delight  as  I 
have  known  a  single  rose  to  give,  unfolding  in 
the  bleak  bitterness  of  a  day  in  February,  when 
this  side  of  the  planet  seemed  to  have  arrived 
at  its  culmination  of  hopelessness,  with  the 


CELIA   THAXTER  239 

Isles  of  Shoals  the  most  hopeless  spot  upon 
its  surface.  One  gets  close  to  the  heart  of 
these  things  ;  they  are  almost  as  precious  as 
Picciola  to  the  prisoner,  and  yield  a  fresh  and 
constant  joy  such  as  the  pleasure-seeking  in 
habitants  of  cities  could  not  find  in  their  whole 
round  of  shifting  diversions.  With  a  bright 
and  cheerful  interior,  open  fires,  books  and 
pictures,  windows  full  of  thrifty  blossoming 
plants  and  climbing  vines,  a  family  of  singing 
birds,  plenty  of  work,  and  a  clear  head  and 
quiet  conscience,  it  would  go  hard  if  one  could 
not  be  happy  even  in  such  loneliness.  Books, 
of  course,  are  inestimable.  Nowhere  does  one 
follow  a  play  of  Shakespeare's  with  greater 
zest,  for  it  brings  the  whole  world,  which  you 
need,  about  you ;  doubly  precious  the  deep 
thoughts  which  wise  men  have  given  to  help 
us,  doubly  sweet  the  songs  of  all  the  poets ;  for 
nothing  comes  between  to  distract  you." 

It  was  not  extraordinary  that  the  joy  of 
human  intercourse,  after  such  estrangement, 
became  a  rapture  to  so  loving  a  nature  as  Celia 
Laighton's  ;  nor  that,  very  early,  before  the 
period  of  fully  ripened  womanhood,  she  should 
have  been  borne  away  from  her  island  by  a 
husband,  a  man  of  birth  and  education,  who 
went  to  preach  to  the  wild  fisher  folk  on  the 
adjacent  island  called  Star. 

The  exuberant  joy  of  her  unformed  maiden 
hood,  with  its  power  of  self-direction,  attracted 


240  CELIA   THAXTER 

the  reserved,  intellectual  nature  of  Mr.  Thaxter. 
He  could  not  dream  that  this  careless,  happy 
creature  possessed  the  strength  and  sweep  of 
wing  which  belonged  to  her  own  sea-gull.  In 
good  hope  of  teaching  and  developing  her,  of 
adding  much  in  which  she  was  uninstructed 
to  the  wisdom  which  the  influences  of  nature 
and  the  natural  affections  had  bred  in  her,  he 
carried  his  wife  to  a  quiet  inland  home,  where 
three  children  were  very  soon  born  to  them. 
Under  the  circumstances,  it  was  not  extraordi 
nary  that  his  ideas  of  education  were  not  alto 
gether  successfully  applied  ;  she  required  more 
strength  than  she  could  summon,  more  adapta 
bility  than  many  a  grown  woman  could  have 
found,  to  face  the  situation,  and  life  became 
difficult  and  full  of  problems  to  them  both. 
Their  natures  were  strongly  contrasted,  but 
perhaps  not  too  strongly  to  complement  each 
other,  if  he  had  fallen  in  love  with  her  as  a 
woman,  and  not  as  a  child.  His  retiring,  schol 
arly  nature  and  habits  drew  him  away  from  the 
world ;  her  overflowing,  sun-loving  being,  like  a 
solar  system  in  itself,  reached  out  on  every  side, 
rejoicing  in  all  created  things. 

Her  introduction  to  the  world  of  letters  was 
by  means  of  her  first  poem,  "  Land-Locked, " 
which,  by  the  hand  of  a  friend,  was  brought 
to  the  notice  of  James  Russell  Lowell,  at  that 
time  editor  of  the  "Atlantic."  He  printed  it 
at  once,  without  exchanging  a  word  with  the 


CELIA   THAXTER  241 

author.  She  knew  nothing  about  it  until  the 
magazine  was  laid  before  her.  This  recogni 
tion  of  her  talent  was  a  delight  indeed,  and  it 
was  one  of  the  happiest  incidents  in  a  life 
which  was  already  overclouded  with  difficulties 
and  sorrow.  It  will  not  be  out  of  place  to  re 
print  this  poem  here,  because  it  must  assure 
every  reader  of  the  pure  poetic  gift  which  was 
in  her.  In  form,  in  movement,  and  in  thought 
it  is  as  beautiful  as  her  latest  work. 

LAND-LOCKED 

Black  lie  the  hills ;  swiftly  doth  daylight  flee ; 
And,  catching  gleams  of  sunset's  dying  smile, 
Through  the  dusk  land  for  many  a  changing  mile 

The  river  runneth  softly  to  the  sea. 

O  happy  river,  could  I  follow  thee  ! 

O  yearning  heart,  that  never  can  be  still ! 

O  wistful  eyes,  that  watch  the  steadfast  hill, 
Longing  for  level  line  of  solemn  sea ! 

Have  patience ;  here  are  flowers  and  songs  of  birds, 
Beauty  and  fragrance,  wealth  of  sound  and  sight, 
All  summer's  glory  thine  from  morn  till  night, 

And  life  too  full  of  joy  for  uttered  words. 

Neither  am  I  ungrateful ;  but  I  dream 
Deliciously  how  twilight  falls  to-night 
Over  the  glimmering  water,  how  the  light 

Dies  blissfully  away,  until  I  seem 

To  feel  the  wind,  sea-scented,  on  my  cheek, 
To  catch  the  sound  of  dusky,  flapping  sail, 
And  dip  of  oars,  and  voices  on  the  gale 

Afar  off,  calling  low,  —  my  name  they  speak  I 


242  CELIA  THAXTER 

O  Earth !  thy  summer  song  of  joy  may  soar 
Ringing  to  heaven  in  triumph.     I  but  crave 
The  sad,  caressing  murmur  of  the  wave 

That  breaks  in  tender  music  on  the  shore. 

With  the  growth  of  Mrs.  Thaxter's  children 
and  the  death  of  her  father,  the  love  and  duty 
she  owed  her  mother  caused  her  to  return  in 
winter  to  the  Shoals,  although  a  portion  of 
every  summer  was  passed  there.  This  was 
her  husband's  wish  ;  his  sense  of  loyalty  to 
age  and  his  deep  attachment  to  his  own  parents 
made  such  a  step  appear  necessary  to  him 
under  the  circumstances. 

But  she  had  already  tasted  of  the  tree  of 
knowledge,  and  the  world  outside  beckoned  to 
her  with  as  fascinating  a  face  as  it  ever  pre 
sented  to  any  human  creature.  It  was  during 
one  of  these  returning  visits  to  the  Shoals  that 
much  of  the  delightful  book  from  which  I  have 
quoted  was  written  ;  a  period  when  she  had  al 
ready  learned  something  of  the  charms  of  soci 
ety,  —  sufficient  to  accentuate  her  appreciation 
of  her  own  past,  and  to  rejoice  in  what  a  larger 
life  now  held  in  store  for  her. 

Lectures,  operas,  concerts,  theatres,  pictures, 
music  above  all,  —  what  were  they  not  to  her  ! 
Did  artists  ever  before  find  such  an  eye  and 
such  an  ear  ?  She  brought  to  them  a  spirit 
prepared  for  harmony,  but  utterly  ignorant  of 
the  science  of  painting  or  music  until  the  light 
of  art  suddenly  broke  upon  her  womanhood. 


CELIA  THAXTER  243 

Of  what  this  new  world  was  to  her  we  find 
some  hint,  of  course,  in  her  letters  ;  but  no 
human  lips,  not  even  her  own  exuberant  power 
of  expression,  could  ever  say  how  her  existence 
was  enriched  and  made  beautiful  through  mu 
sic.  Artists  who  sang  to  her,  or  those  who 
rehearsed  the  finest  music  on  the  piano  or  vio 
lin  or  flute,  or  those  who  brought  their  pictures 
and  put  them  before  her  while  she  listened,  — 
they  alone,  in  a  measure,  understood  what  these 
things  signified,  and  how  she  was  lifted  quite 
away  by  them  from  the  ordinary  level  of  life. 
They  were  inspired  to  do  for  her  what  they 
could  seldom  do  for  any  other  creature  ;  and  her 
generous  response,  overflowing,  almost  extrava 
gant  in  expression,  was  never  half  enough  to 
begin  to  tell  the  new  life  they  brought  to  her. 
The  following  lines  from  a  sonnet  addressed  to 
the  tenor  singer  William  J.  Winch,  a  singer 
who  has  given  much  pleasure  to  many  persons 
by  his  beautiful  voice,  will  convey  some  idea 
of  the  deep  feeling  which  his  ardent  rendering 
of  great  songs  stirred  in  her  :  — 

"  Carry  us  captive,  thou  with  the  strong  heart 
And  the  clear  head,  and  nature  sweet  and  sound ! 
Most  willing  captives  we  to  thy  great  art. 

Sing,  and  we  ask  no  greater  joy  than  this, 
Only  to  listen,  thrilling  to  the  song, 

Borne  skyward  where  the  winged  hosts  rejoice." 

Mrs.  Thaxter  found  herself,  as  the  years  went 


244  CELIA  THAXTER 

on,  the  centre  of  a  company  who  rather  selected 
themselves  than  were  selected  from  the  vast 
number  of  persons  who  frequented  her  bro 
thers'  "  house  of  entertainment  "  at  the  islands. 
Her  "parlor,"  as  it  was  called,  was  a  milieu 
quite  as  interesting  as  any  of  the  "  salons  "  of 
the  past.  Her  pronounced  individuality  forbade 
the  intrusion  even  of  a  fancy  of  comparison 
with  anything  else,  and  equally  forbade  the  pos 
sibility  of  rivalry.  There  was  only  one  thought 
in  the  mind  of  the  frequenters  of  her  parlor,  — 
that  of  gratitude  for  the  pleasure  and  oppor 
tunity  she  gave  them,  and  a  genuine  wish  to 
please  her  and  to  become  her  friends.  She 
possessed  the  keen  instincts  of  a  child  with  re 
gard  to  people.  If  they  were  unlovable  to  her, 
if  they  were  for  any  reason  unsympathetic, 
nothing  could  bring  her  to  overcome  her  dis 
like.  She  was  in  this  particular  more  like  some 
wild  thing  than  a  creature  of  the  nineteenth 
century ;  indeed,  one  of  her  marked  traits  was 
a  curious  intractability  of  nature.  I  believe 
that  no  worldly  motive  ever  influenced  her  rela 
tion  with  any  human  creature.  Of  course  these 
native  qualities  made  her  more  ardently  devoted 
in  her  friendships  ;  but  it  went  hardly  with  her 
to  ingratiate  those  persons  for  whom  she  felt 
a  natural  repulsion,  or  even  sometimes  to  be 
gentle  with  them.  Later  in  life  she  learned  to 
call  no  man  "common  or  unclean;"  but  coming 
into  the  world,  as  she  did,  full  grown,  like  Mi- 


CELIA   THAXTER  245 

herva  in  the  legend,  with  keen  eyes,  and  every 
sense  alive  to  discern  pretension,  untruth,  un 
godliness  in  guise  of  the  church,  and  all  the 
uncleanness  of  the  earth,  these  things  were  as 
much  a  surprise  to  her  as  it  was,  on  the  other 
hand,  to  find  the  wondrous  world  of  art  and  the 
lives  of  the  saints.  Perhaps  no  large  social  suc 
cess  was  ever  achieved  upon  such  unworldly 
conditions ;  she  swung  as  free  as  possible  of 
the  world  of  society  and  its  opinions,  forming  a 
centre  of  her  own,  built  up  on  the  sure  foun 
dations  of  love  and  loyalty.  She  saw  as  much 
as  any  woman  of  the  time  of  large  numbers 
of  people,  and  she  was  able  to  give  them  the 
best  kind  of  social  enjoyment :  music,  pictures, 
poetry,  and  conversation  ;  the  latter  sometimes 
poor  and  sometimes  good,  according  to  the 
drift  which  swept  through  her  beautiful  room. 
Mrs.  Thaxter  was  generous  in  giving  invitations 
to  her  parlor,  but  to  its  frequenters  she  said, 
"If  people  do  not  enjoy  what  they  find,  they 
must  go  their  way ;  my  work  and  the  music 
will  not  cease."  The  study  of  nature  and  art 
was  always  going  forward  either  on  or  around 
her  work-table.  The  keynote  of  conversation 
was  struck  there  for  those  who  were  able  to 
hear  it.  We  were  reminded  of  William  Blake's 
verse :  — 

"  I  give  you  the  end  of  a  golden  string, 

Only  wind  it  into  a  ball, 
It  will  lead  you  in  at  Heaven's  gate, 
Built  in  Jerusalem  wall." 


246  CELIA  THAXTER 

Here  it  was  that  Whittier  could  be  heard  at  his 
best,  sympathetic,  stimulating,  uplifting,  as  he 
alone  could  be,  and  yet  as  he,  with  his  Quaker 
training  to  silence,  was  so  seldom  moved  to 
prove  himself.  Here  he  would  sit  near  her 
hour  after  hour ;  sometimes  mending  her  aeo- 
lian  harp  while  they  talked  together,  some 
times  reading  aloud  to  the  assembled  company. 
Here  was  Rose  Lamb,  artist  and  dear  friend  ; 
and  here  Mrs.  Mary  Hemenway  was  a  most  be 
loved  presence,  with  her  eager  enthusiasm  for 
reform,  yet  with  a  modesty  of  bearing  which 
made  young  and  old  press  to  her  side.  She 
loved  Celia  Thaxter,  who  in  her  turn  was  deeply 
and  reverently  attached  to  Mrs.  Hemenway. 

The  early  affection  of  both  Mr.  Thaxter  and 
his  wife  for  William  Morris  Hunt  grew  to  be 
the  love  of  a  lifetime.  Hunt's  grace,  versatil 
ity,  and  charm,  not  to  speak  of  his  undoubted 
genius,  exerted  their  combined  fascination  over 
these  appreciative  friends  in  common  with  the 
rest  of  his  art  -  loving  contemporaries ;  but  to 
these  two,  each  in  their  several  ways,  Hunt  felt 
himself  equally  attracted,  and  the  last  sad  sum 
mer  of  his  life  he  gladly  turned  to  Celia  Thax 
ter  in  her  island  home  as  a  sure  refuge  in  time 
of  trouble.  It  was  she  who  watched  him  day 
by  day,  listening  to  his  words,  which  came 
clothed  with  a  kind  of  inspiration.  "  Whatever 
genius  may  be,"  said  Tom  Appleton,  "we  all 
feel  that  William  Hunt  had  it.  His  going  is 


CELIA  THAXTER  247 

the  extinction  of  a  great  light ;  a  fervent  hand 
is  cold  ;  and  the  warmth  which  glowed  through 
so  many  friends  and  disciples  is  like  a  trodden 
ember,  extinguished."  It  was  Celia  Thaxter's 
hurrying  footsteps  which  traced  her  friend  to  the 
spot  where,  in  extreme  weakness,  he  fell  in  death. 
She  wrote,  "  It  was  that  pretty  lake  where  my 
wild  roses  had  been  blooming  all  summer,  and 
where  the  birds  dipped  and  sang  at  sunrise." 

Her  gratitude  to  the  men  and  women  who 
brought  music  to  her  door  knew  no  limit ;  it 
was  strong,  deep,  and  unforgetting.  "What 
can  I  ever  do  for  them,"  she  would  say,  "when 
I  remember  the  joy  they  bring  me  !  " 

Julius  Eichberg  was  one  of  the  earliest 
friends  who  ministered  in  this  way  to  her  hap 
piness.  Her  letters  of  the  time  overflow  with 
the  descriptions  of  programmes  for  the  day, 
when  Mr.  Paine  and  Mr.  Eichberg  would  play, 
together  or  alone,  during  long  mornings  and 
afternoons.  "I  am  lost  in  bliss,"  she  wrote; 
"every  morning,  afternoon,  and  evening,  Bee 
thoven  !  I  am  emerging  out  of  all  my  clouds 
by  help  of  it ;  it  is  divine  !  " 

And  again,  writing  of  Mr.  Paine  in  his  own 
house,  she  said  :  "  I  am  in  the  midst  of  the 
awful  and  thrilling  music  of  the  CEdipus  Ty- 
rannus,  and  it  curdles  my  blood ;  we  are  all 
steeped  in  it,  for  J.  K.  P.  goes  on  and  on  com 
posing  it  all  the  time,  and  the  tremendous 
chords  thrill  the  very  timbers  of  the  house. 
It  is  most  interesting  !  " 


248  CELIA   THAXTER 

Of  Arthur  Whiting,  too,  and  his  wife,  whose 
musical  gifts  she  placed  among  the  first,  she 
frequently  wrote  and  spoke  with  loving  appre 
ciation.  These  friendships  were  a  never  failing 
source  of  gladness  to  her. 

Later  in  life  came  Mr.  William  Mason,  who 
was  the  chief  minister  to  her  joy  in  music,  her 
enlightener,  her  consoler,  to  the  end.  Those 
who  loved  her  best  must  always  give  him  the 
tribute  of  their  admiration  and  grateful  regard. 
Mr.  Mason  must  have  known  her  keen  -grati 
tude,  for  who  understood  better  than  he  the 
feeling  by  which  she  was  lifted  away  from  the 
things  of  this  world  by  the  power  of  music  ! 

"  The  dignity  of  labor  "  is  a  phrase  we  have 
often  heard  repeated  in  modern  life,  but  it  was 
one  unnecessary  to  be  spoken  by  Celia  Thaxter. 
It  may  easily  be  said  of  her  that  one  of  the 
finest  lessons  she  unconsciously  taught  was  not 
only  the  value  of  labor,  but  the  joy  of  doing 
things  well.  The  necessities  of  her  position, 
as  I  have  already  indicated,  demanded  a  great 
deal,  but  she  responded  to  the  need  with  a 
readiness  and  generosity  great  enough  to  extort 
admiration  from  those  who  knew  her.  How 
much  she  contributed  to  the  comfort  of  the 
lives  of  those  she  loved  at  the  Shoals  we  have 
endeavored  to  show ;  how  beautiful  her  garden 
was  there,  in  the  summer,  all  the  world  could 
see ;  but  at  one  period  there  was  also  a  farm  at 
Kittery  Point,  to  be  made  beautiful  and  com- 


CELIA   THAXTER  249 

fortable  by  her  industry,  where  one  of  her  sons 
still  lives  ;  and  a  pied  d  terre  in  Boston  or  in 
Portsmouth,  whither  she  came  in  the  winter 
with  her  eldest  son,  who  was  especially  depen 
dent  upon  her  love  and  care  :  and  all  these 
changes  demanded  much  of  her  time  and 
strength. 

She  was  certainly  one  of  the  busiest  women 
in  the  world.  Writing  from  Kittery  Point  Sep 
tember  6,  1880,  she  says:  "It  is  divinely 
lovely  here,  and  the  house  is  charming.  I  have 
brought  a  servant  over  from  the  hotel,  and  it  is 
a  blessing  to  be  able  to  make  them  all  comfort 
able  ;  to  set  them  down  in  the  charming  dining- 
room  overlooking  the  smooth,  curved  crescent 
of  sandy  beach,  with  the  long  rollers  breaking 
white,  and  the  shoals  looming  on  the  far  sea- 
line.  .  .  .  But  oh,  how  tired  we  all  get !  I  shall 
be  quite  ready  for  my  rest ! " 

This  note  gives  a  picture  of  her  life.  She 
was  always  seeking  to  make  a  bright  spot 
around  her ;  to  give  of  herself  in  some  way. 
There  is  a  bit  in  her  book  which  illustrates  this 
instinct.  The  incident  occurred  during  a  long, 
dreary  storm  at  the  Shoals.  Two  men  had 
come  in  a  boat  asking  for  help.  "  A  little  child 
had  died  at  Star  Island,  and  they  could  not  sail 
to  the  mainland,  and  had  no  means  to  construct 
a  coffin  among  themselves.  All  day  I  watched 
the  making  of  that  little  chrysalis  ;  and  at  night 
the  last  nail  was  driven  in,  and  it  lay  across  a 


250  CELIA  THAXTER 

bench,  in  the  midst  of  the  litter  of  the  work 
shop,  and  a  curious  stillness  seemed  to  emanate 
from  the  senseless  boards.  I  went  back  to  the 
house  and  gathered  a  handful  of  scarlet  gera 
nium,  and  returned  with  it  through  the  rain. 
The  brilliant  blossoms  were  sprinkled  with  glit 
tering  drops.  I  laid  them  in  the  little  coffin, 
while  the  wind  wailed  so  sorrowfully  outside, 
and  the  rain  poured  against  the  windows.  Two 
men  came  through  the  mist  and  storm,  and  one 
swung  the  light  little  shell  to  his  shoulder,  and 
they  carried  it  away,  and  the  gathering  dark 
ness  shut  down  and  hid  them  as  they  tossed 
among  the  waves.  I  never  saw  the  little  girl, 
but  where  they  buried  her  I  know ;  the  light 
house  shines  close  by,  and  every  night  the 
quiet,  constant  ray  steals  to  her  grave  and 
softly  touches  it,  as  if  to  say,  with  a  caress, 
'  Sleep  well !  Be  thankful  you  are  spared  so 
much  that  I  see  humanity  endure,  fixed  here 
forever  where  I  stand.' ' 

We  have  seen  the  profound  love  she  felt  for, 
and  the  companionship  she  found  in,  nature 
and  natural  objects ;  but  combined  with  these 
sentiments,  or  developed  simply  by  her  love  to 
speak  more  directly,  was  a  very  uncommon 
power  of  observation.  This  power  grew  day  by 
day,  and  the  delightful  correspondence  which 
existed  between  Bradford  Torrey  and  herself, 
although  they  had  never  met  face  to  face,  bears 
witness  to  her  constant  mental  record  and 


CELIA  THAXTER  251 

memory  respecting  the  habits  of  birds  and 
woodland  manners.  Every  year  we  find  her 
longing  for  larger  knowledge  ;  books  and  men 
of  science  attracted  her;  and  if  her  life  had 
been  less  intensely  laborious,  in  order  to  make 
those  who  belonged  to  her  comfortable  and 
happy,  what  might  she  not  have  achieved ! 
Her  nature  was  replete  with  boundless  possi 
bilities,  and  we  find  ourselves  asking  the  old, 
old  question,  Must  the  artist  forever  crush  the 
wings  by  which  he  flies  against  such  terrible 
limitations  ?  —  a  question  never  to  be  answered 
in  this  world. 

Her  observations  began  with  her  earliest 
breath  at  the  islands.  "  I  remember,"  she  says, 
"  in  the  spring,  kneeling  on  the  ground  to  seek 
the  first  blades  of  grass  that  pricked  through 
the  soil,  and  bringing  them  into  the  house  to 
study  and  wonder  over.  Better  than  a  shopful 
of  toys  they  were  to  me  !  Whence  came  their 
color?  How  did  they  draw  their  sweet,  re 
freshing  tint  from  the  brown  earth,  or  the 
limpid  air,  or  the  white  light  ?  Chemistry  was 
not  at  hand  to  answer  me,  and  all  her  wisdom 
would  not  have  dispelled  the  wonder.  Later, 
the  little  scarlet  pimpernel  charmed  me.  It 
seemed  more  than  a  flower ;  it  was  like  a 
human  thing.  I  knew  it  by  its  homely  name 
of  'poor  man's  weather  glass.'  It  was  so  much 
wiser  than  I ;  for  when  the  sky  was  yet  with 
out  a  cloud,  softly  it  clasped  its  small  red  petals 


252  CELIA   THAXTER 

together,  folding  its  golden  heart  in  safety  from 
the  shower  that  was  sure  to  come.  How  could 
it  know  so  much  ?  " 

Whatever  sorrows  life  brought  to  her,  and 
they  were  many  and  of  the  heaviest,  this  ex 
quisite  enjoyment  of  nature,  the  tender  love 
and  care  for  every  created  thing  within  her 
reach,  always  stayed  her  heart.  To  see  her 
lift  a  flower  in  her  fingers,  —  fingers  which 
gave  one  a  sense  of  supporting  everything 
which  she  touched,  expressive,  too,  of  fineness 
in  every  fibre,  although  strong  and  worn  with 
labor,  —  to  see  her  handle  these  wonderful 
creatures  which  she  worshiped,  was  something 
not  to  be  forgotten.  The  lines  of  Keats,  — 

"  Open  afresh  your  rounds  of  starry  folds, 
Ye  ardent  marigolds  ! " 

were  probably  oftener  flitting  through  her  mind 
or  from  her  lips  than  through  the  mind  or  from 
the  lips  of  any  since  Keats  wrote  them.  She 
remembered  that  he  said  he  thought  his  "in- 
tensest  pleasure  in  life  had  been  to  watch  the 
growth  of  flowers,"  but  she  was  sure  he  never 
felt  their  beauty  more  devoutly  "  than  the  little 
half -savage  being  who  knelt,  like  a  fire-wor 
shiper,  to  watch  the  unfolding  of  those  golden 
disks." 

The  time  came  at  last,  as  it  comes  to  every 
human  being,  for  asking  the  reason  of  the  faith 
that  was  in  her.  It  was  difficult  for  her  to  re- 


CELIA  THAXTER  253 

ply.  Her  heart  had  often  questioned  whether 
she  believed,  and  what ;  and  yet,  as  she  has 
said,  she  could  not  keep  her  faith  out  of  her 
poems  if  she  would.  We  find  the  following 
passage  in  "Among  the  Isles  of  Shoals,"  which 
throws  a  light  beyond  that  of  her  own  lan 
tern. 

"When  the  boat  was  out  late,"  she  says,  "in 
soft,  moonless  summer  nights,  I  used  to  light 
a  lantern,  and  going  down  to  the  water's  edge 
take  my  station  between  the  timbers  of  the 
slip,  and  with  the  lantern  at  my  feet  sit  wait 
ing  in  the  darkness,  quite  content,  knowing  my 
little  star  was  watched  for,  and  that  the  safety 
of  the  boat  depended  in  a  great  measure  upon 
it.  ...  I  felt  so  much  a  part  of  the  Lord's 
universe,  I  was  no  more  afraid  of  the  dark  than 
the  waves  or  winds  ;  but  I  was  glad  to  hear  at 
last  the  creaking  of  the  mast  and  the  rattling 
of  the  rowlocks  as  the  boat  approached." 

"A  part  of  the  Lord's  universe,"  — that 
Celia  Thaxter  always  felt  herself  to  be,  and  for 
many  years  she  was  impatient  of  other  teach 
ing  than  what  nature  brought  to  her.  As  life 
went  on,  and  the  mingled  mysteries  of  human 
pain  and  grief  were  unfolded,  she  longed  for  a 
closer  knowledge.  At  first  she  sought  it  every 
where,  and  patiently,  save  in  or  through  the 
churches ;  with  them  she  was  long  zwpatient. 
At  last,  after  ardent  search  through  the  reli 
gious  books  and  by  means  of  the  teachers  of 


254  CELIA   THAXTER 

the  Orient,  the  Bible  was  born  anew  for  her, 
and  the  New  Testament  became  her  stay  and 
refreshment.  At  this  period  she  wrote  to  her 
friend,  Mrs.  H.  M.  Rogers:  "  K.  and  I  read 
the  Bhagavad  Gita  every  day  of  our  lives,  and 
when  we  get  to  the  end  we  begin  again  !  It  is 
a  great  thing  to  keep  one's  mind  full  of  it,  per 
meated  as  it  were ;  and  I  think  Mohini's  own 
words  are  a  great  help  and  inspiration  every 
where,  all  through  it  as  well  as  in  the  beautiful 
introduction.  I  have  written  out  clearly  on  the 
margin  of  my  copy  every  text  which  he  has 
quoted  from  the  Scriptures,  and  find  it  most 
interesting.  '  Truth  is  one.'  " 

Nothing  was  ever  "born  anew"  in  Celia 
Thaxter  which  she  did  not  strive  to  share  with 
others.  She  could  keep  nothing  but  secrets  to 
herself.  Joys,  experiences  of  every  kind,  sor 
rows  and  misfortunes,  except  when  they  could 
darken  the  lives  of  others,  were  all  brought 
open  handed  and  open  hearted,  to  those  she 
loved.  Her  generosity  knew  no  limits. 

There  is  a  description  by  her  of  the  flood 
which  swept  over  her  being,  and  seemed  to 
carry  her  away  from  the  earth,  when  she  once 
saw  the  great  glory  of  the  Lord  in  a  rainbow 
at  the  island.  She  hid  her  face  from  the  won 
der  ;  it  was  more  than  she  could  bear.  "  I  felt 
then,"  she  said,  "how  I  longed  to  speak  these 
things  which  made  life  so  sweet,  —  to  speak 
the  wind,  the  cloud,  the  bird's  flight,  the  sea's 


UNIVERSITY 

OF 


CELIA  THAXTER  255 

murmur,  —  and  ever  the  wish  grew  ;  "  and  so 
it  was  she  became,  growing  from  and  with  this 
wish,  a  poet  the  world  will  remember.  Dr. 
Holmes  said  once  in  conversation  that  he 
thought  the  value  of  a  poet  to  the  world  was 
not  so  much  the  pleasure  that  this  or  that 
poem  might  give  to  certain  readers,  or  even 
perchance  to  posterity,  as  the  fact  that  a  poet 
was  known  to  be  one  who  was  sometimes  rapt 
out  of  himself  into  the  region  of  the  Divine; 
that  the  spirit  had  descended  upon  him  and 
taught  him  what  he  should  speak. 

This  is  especially  true  of  Celia  Thaxter, 
whose  life  was  divorced  from  worldliness,  while 
it  was  instinct  with  the  keenest  enjoyment  of 
life  and  of  God's  world.  She  liked  to  read  her 
poems  aloud  when  people  asked  for  them  ;  and 
if  there  was  ever  a  genuine  reputation  from 
doing  a  thing  well,  such  a  reputation  was  hers. 
From  the  first  person  who  heard  her  the  wish 
began  to  spread,  until,  summer  after  summer, 
in  her  parlor,  listeners  would  gather  if  she 
would  promise  to  read  to  them.  Night  after 
night  she  has  held  her  sway,  with  tears  and 
smiles  from  her  responsive  little  audiences, 
which  seemed  to  gain  new  courage  and  light 
from  what  she  gave  them.  Her  unspeakably 
interesting  nature  was  always  betraying  itself 
and  shining  out  between  the  lines.  Occasion 
ally  she  yielded  to  the  urgent  claims  brought 
to  bear  upon  her  by  her  friend  Mrs.  Johnson, 


256  CELIA  THAXTER 

of  the  Woman's  Prison,  and  would  go  to  read 
to  the  sad-eyed  audience  at  Sherborn.  Even 
those  hearts  dulled  by  wrong  and  misery  awak 
ened  at  the  sound  of  her  voice.  It  was  not  al 
together  this  or  that  verse  or  ballad  that  made 
the  tears  flow,  or  brought  a  laugh  from  her 
hearers ;  it  was  the  deep  sympathy  which  she 
carried  in  her  heart  and  which  poured  out  in 
her  voice ;  a  hope,  too,  for  them,  and  for  what 
they  might  yet  become.  She  could  not  go  fre 
quently,  —  she  was  too  deeply  laden  with  re 
sponsibilities  nearer  home ;  but  it  was  always 
a  holiday  when  she  was  known  to  be  coming, 
and  a  season  of  light-heartedness  to  Mrs.  John 
son  as  well  as  to  the  prisoners. 

It  is  a  strange  fallacy  that  a  poet  may  not 
read  his  own  verses  well.  Who  besides  the 
writer  should  comprehend  every  shade  of  mean 
ing  which  made  the  cloud  or  sunshine  of  his 
poem  ?  Mrs.  Thaxter  certainly  read  her  own 
verse  with  a  fullness  of  suggestion  which  no 
other  reader  could  have  given  it ;  and  her  voice 
was  sufficient,  too,  although  not  loud  or  strik 
ing,  to  fill  and  satisfy  the  ear  of  the  listener. 
But  at  the  risk  of  repetition  we  recall  that  it 
was  her  own  generous,  beautiful  nature,  unlike 
that  of  any  other,  which  made  her  reading  help 
ful  to  all  who  heard  her.  She  speaks  some 
where  of  the  birds  on  her  island  as  "  so  tame, 
knowing  how  well  they  are  beloved,  that  they 
gather  on  the  window-sills,  twittering  and  flut- 


CELIA  THAXTER  257 

tering,  gay  and  graceful,  turning  their  heads 
this  way  and  that,  eying  you  askance  without  a 
trace  of  fear."  And  so  it  was  with  the  human 
beings  who  came  to  know  her.  They  were 
attracted,  they  came  near,  they  flew  under  her 
protection,  and  were  not  disappointed  of  their 
rest. 

Four  years  before  Mrs.  Thaxter  left  this 
world,  when  she  was  still  only  fifty-five  years 
old,  she  was  stricken  with  a  shaft  of  death. 
Her  overworked  body  was  prostrated  in  sudden 
agony,  and  she,  well,  young,  vigorous  beyond 
the  ordinary  lot  of  mortals,  found  herself  weak 
and  unable  to  rise.  "  I  do  so  hate  figuring  as 
an  interesting  invalid,"  she  wrote.  "  Perhaps 
I  have  been  doing  too  much,  getting  settled. 
But  oh,  I  used  to  be  able  to  do  tf/zything ! 
Where  is  my  old  energy  and  vigor  and  power 
gone  !  It  should  not  ebb  away  quite  so  soon  ! " 
She  recovered  her  wonted  tone  and  sufficient 
strength  for  every-day  needs,  and  still  found 
"  life  so  interesting."  But  her  keen  observa 
tion  had  been  brought  to  bear  upon  her  own 
condition,  and  she  suspected  that  she  might 
flit  away  from  us  quickly  some  day. 

Except  for  one  who  was  especially  dependent 
upon  her  she  was  quite  ready.  The  surprises 
of  this  life  were  so  wonderful,  it  was  easy  for 
her  to  believe  in  the  surprises  of  the  unseen  ; 
but  her  letters  were  full  as  usual  of  the  things 
which  feed  the  springs  of  joy  around  us  in  this 


258  CELIA   THAXTER 

world.  One  summer  it  was  the  first  volume  of 
poems  of  Richard  Watson  Gilder  which  gave 
her  great  happiness.  She  talked  of  them,  re 
cited  them,  sent  them  to  her  friends,  and  finally 
wrote  to  Mr.  Gilder  himself.  Since  her  death 
he  has  said,  "  I  never  saw  Mrs.  Thaxter  but 
once,  and  that  lately ;  but  her  immediate  and 
surprising  and  continuous  appreciation  and  en 
couragement  I  can  never  forget."  How  many 
other  contemporaneous  writers  and  artists  could 
say  the  same  ! 

The  transparent  simplicity  of  her  character 
and  manners,  her  love  and  capacity  for  labor, 
were  combined  with  equal  capacities  for  enjoy 
ing  the  complex  in  others  and  a  pure  appetite 
for  pleasure.  It  would  be  impossible  to  find  a 
more  childlike  power  of  enjoyment. 

A  perfect  happiness  came  to  her,  during  the 
last  eight  years  of  her  life,  with  the  birth  of 
her  grandchildren.  The  little  boy  who  sur 
prised  her  into  bliss  one  day  by  crying  out  "  I 
'dore  you,  I  'dore  you,  granna !  I  love  you 
every  breff !  "  was  the  creature  perhaps  dearest 
to  her  heart ;  but  she  loved  them  all,  and  talked 
and  wrote  of  them  with  abandonment  of  rejoi 
cing.  Writing  to  her  friend  Mrs.  Rogers,  she 
says  :  "  Little  E.  stayed  with  his  'granna,'  who 
worships  the  ground  he  walks  on,  and  counted 
every  beat  of  his  quick-fluttering  little  heart. 
Oh,  I  never  meant,  in  my  old  age,  to  become 
subject  to  the  thrall  of  a  love  like  this;  it  is 


CELIA   THAXTER  259 

almost  dreadful,  so  absorbing,  so  stirring  down 
to  the  deeps.  For  the  tiny  creature  is  so  old 
and  wise  and  sweet,  and  so  fascinating  in  his 
sturdy  common  sense  and  clear  intelligence ; 
and  his  affection  for  me  is  a  wonderful,  exqui 
site  thing,  the  sweetest  flower  that  has  bloomed 
for  me  in  all  my  life  through." 

Her  enjoyment  of  art  could  not  fade  nor  lose 
its  keenness.  Her  life  had  been  shut,  as  we 
have  seen,  into  very  narrow  limits.  She  never 
had  seen  the  city  of  New  York,  and  life  outside 
the  circle  we  have  described  was  an  unknown 
world  to  her.  She  went  to  Europe  once  with 
her  eldest  brother,  when  he  was  ill,  for  three 
months,  and  she  has  left  in  her  letters  some 
striking  descriptions  of  what  she  saw  there; 
but  her  days  were  closely  bounded  by  the  ne 
cessities  we  have  suggested.  Nevertheless  the 
great  world  of  art  was  more  to  Celia  Thaxter 
than  to  others ;  perhaps  for  the  very  reason 
that  her  mind  was  open  and  un jaded.  Her 
rapture  over  the  great  players  from  England ; 
her  absolute  agony,  after  seeing  "The  Cup" 
played  by  them  in  London,  lest  she  could  never, 
never  tell  the  happiness  it  was  to  her,  with 
Tennyson's  words  on  her  own  tongue,  as  it 
were,  to  follow  Miss  Terry's  perfect  enuncia 
tion  of  the  lines,  —  these  enjoyments,  true 
pleasures  as  indeed  they  are,  did  not  lose  their 
power  over  her. 

Gilbert  and   Sullivan,  too,  could  not  have 


260  CELIA   THAXTER 

found  a  more  amused  admirer.  "  Pinafore " 
never  grew  stale  for  her,  and  her  brothers 
yielded  to  her  fancy,  or  pleased  it,  by  naming 
their  little  steamer  Pinafore.  She  went  to  the 
theatre  again  and  again  to  see  this,  and  all  the 
succeeding  comedies  by  the  same  hands.  She 
never  seemed  to  weary  of  their  fun. 

But  the  poets  were  her  great  fountain  of 
refreshment ;  "  Siloa's  brook "  was  her  chief 
resort.  Tennyson  was  her  chosen  master,  and 
there  were  few  of  his  lines  she  did  not  know  by 
heart.  Her  feeling  for  nature  was  satisfied  by 
the  incomparable  verses  in  which  he  portrays 
the  divine  light  shining  behind  the  life  of  nat 
ural  things.  How  often  have  we  heard  her 
murmuring  to  herself,  — 

"  The  wind  sounds  like  a  silver  wire," 

or, 

"  To  watch  the  emerald-colored  water  falling," 
or, 

"  Black  as  ash-buds  on  the  front  of  March." 

Whatever  it  might  be  she  was  observing,  there 
was  some  line  of  this  great  interpreter  of  na 
ture  ready  to  make  the  moment  melodious. 
Shakespeare's  sonnets  were  also  her  close  com 
panions  ;  indeed,  she  seized  and  retained  a  cloud 
of  beautiful  things  in  her  trustworthy  memory. 
They  fed  and  cheered  her  on  her  singing  way. 
In  the  quiet  loveliness  of  early  summer,  and 
before  the  tide  of  humanity  swept  down  upon 
Appledore,  she  went  for  the  last  time,  in  June, 


CELIA   THAXTER  261 

1894,  with  a  small  company  of  intimate  friends, 
to  revisit  the  different  islands  and  the  well- 
known  haunts  most  dear  to  her.  The  days  were 
still  and  sweet,  and  she  lingered  lovingly  over 
the  old  places,  telling  the  local  incidents  which 
occurred  to  her,  and  touching  the  whole  with 
a  fresh  light.  Perhaps  she  knew  that  it  was  a 
farewell ;  but  if  it  had  been  revealed  to  her, 
she  could  not  have  been  more  tender  and  loving 
in  her  spirit  to  the  life  around  her. 

How  suddenly  it  seemed  at  last  that  her  days 
with  us  were  ended !  She  had  been  listening 
to  music,  had  been  reading  to  her  little  com 
pany,  had  been  delighting  in  one  of  Appleton 
Brown's  new  pictures,  and  then  she  laid  her 
down  to  sleep  for  the  last  time,  and  flitted  away 
from  her  mortality. 

The  burial  was  at  her  island,  on  a  quiet  after 
noon  in  the  late  summer.  Her  parlor,  in  which 
the  body  lay,  was  again  made  radiant,  after  her 
own  custom,  with  the  flowers  from  her  garden, 
and  a  bed  of  sweet  bay  was  prepared  by  her 
friends  Appleton  Brown  and  Childe  Hassam,  on 
which  her  form  was  laid. 

William  Mason  once  more  played  the  music 
from  Schumann  which  she  chiefly  loved,  and  an 
old  friend,  James  De  Normandie,  paid  a  brief 
tribute  of  affection,  spoken  for  all  those  who 
surrounded  her.  She  was  borne  by  her  brothers 
and  those  nearest  to  her  up  to  the  silent  spot 
where  her  body  was  left. 


262  CELIA   THAXTER 

The  day  was  still  and  soft,  and  the  veiled  sun 
was  declining  as  the  solemn  procession,  bearing 
flowers,  followed  to  the  sacred  place.  At  a 
respectful  distance  above  stood  a  wide  ring  of 
interested  observers,  but  only  those  who  knew 
her  and  loved  her  best  drew  near.  After  all 
was  done,  and  the  body  was  at  rest  upon  the 
fragrant  bed  prepared  for  it,  the  young  flower- 
bearers  brought  their  burdens  to  cover  her. 
The  bright,  tear-stained  faces  of  those  who  held 
up  their  arms  full  of  flowers  to  be  heaped  upon 
the  spot  until  it  became  a  mound  of  blossoms, 
allied  the  scene,  in  beauty  and  simplicity,  to  the 
solemn  rites  of  antiquity. 

It  was  indeed  a  poet's  burial,  but  it  was  far 
more  than  that :  it  was  the  celebration  of  the 
passing  of  a  large  and  beneficent  soul. 


WHITTIER 

NOTES   OF   HIS   LIFE  AND   OF   HIS 
FRIENDSHIPS 


WHITTIER 

BORN   DECEMBER   17,  1807;    DIED   SEPTEM 
BER   7,  1892 

THE  figure  of  the  Quaker  poet,  as  he  stood 
before  the  world,  was  unlike  that  of  any  other 
prominent  figure  which  has  walked  across  the 
stage  of  life.  This  may  be  said,  of  course,  of 
every  individual ;  yet  the  likenesses  between 
men  of  a  given  era,  or  between  modern  men  of 
strong  character  and  those  of  the  ancient  world, 
cause  us  sometimes  to  exclaim  with  wonder  at 
the  evident  repetitions  in  development.  One 
can  hardly  walk  through  the  galleries  of  antique 
statues,  nor  read  the  passages  of  Plutarch  or 
Thucydides,  without  rinding  this  idea  thrust 
upon  the  mind.  But  with  regard  to  Whittier, 
such  comparisons  were  never  made,  even  in 
fancy.  His  lithe,  upright  form,  full  of  quick 
movement,  his  burning  eye,  his  keen  wit,  bore 
witness  to  a  contrast  in  himself  with  the  staid, 
controlled  manner  and  the  habit  of  the  sect  into 
which  he  was  born.  The  love  and  devotion  with 
which  he  adhered  to  the  Quaker  Church  and 
doctrines  served  to  accentuate  his  unlikeness  to 
the  men  of  his  time,  because  he  early  became 


266  WHITTIER 

also  one  of  the  most  determined  contestants  in 
one  of  the  sternest  combats  which  the  world 
has  witnessed. 

Neither  in  the  ranks  of  poets  nor  divines  nor 
philosophers  do  we  find  his  counterpart.  He 
felt  a  certain  brotherhood  with  Robert  Burns, 
and  early  loved  his  genius ;  but  where  were  two 
more  unlike  ?  A  kind  of  solitude  of  life  and 
experience,  greater  than  that  which  usually 
throws  its  shadow  on  the  human  soul,  invested 
him  in  his  passage  through  the  world.  'The  re 
finement  of  his  education,  the  calm  of  nature 
by  which,  in  youth,  he  was  surrounded,  the  few 
books  which  he  made  his  own,  nearly  all  serious 
in  their  character,  and  the  religious  atmosphere 
in  which  he  was  nurtured,  all  tended  to  form 
an  environment  in  which  knowledge  developed 
into  wisdom,  and  the  fiery  soul  formed  a  power 
to  restrain  or  to  express  its  force  for  the  good 
of  humanity. 

But  as  surely  as  he  was  a  Quaker,  so  surely 
also  did  he  feel  himself  a  part  of  the  life  of 
New  England.  He  believed  in  the  ideals  of 
iis  time  ;  the  simple  ways  of  living ;  the  eager 
nourishing  of  all  good  things  by  the  sacrifice 
of  many  private  wishes  ;  in  short,  he  made  one 
cause  with  Garrison  and  Phillips,  Emerson  and 
Lowell,  Longfellow  and  Holmes.  His  standards 
were  often  different  from  those  of  his  friends, 
but  their  ideals  were  on  the  whole  made  in 
commoa 


WHITTIER  267 

His  friends  were  to  Whittier,  more  than  to 
most  men,  an  unfailing  source  of  daily  happi 
ness  and  gratitude.  With  the  advance  of  years, 
and  the  death  of  his  unmarried  sister,  his  friends 
became  all  in  all  to  him.  They  were  his  mother, 
his  sister,  and  his  brother  ;  but  in  a  certain  sense 
they  were  always  friends  of  the  imagination. 
He  saw  some  of  them  only  at  rare  intervals, 
and  sustained  his  relations  with  them  chiefly  in 
his  hurried  correspondence.  He  never  suffered 
himself  to  complain  of  what  they  were  not ; 
but  what  they  were,  in  loyalty  to  chosen  aims, 
and  in  their  affection  for  him,  was  an  unend 
ing  source  of  pleasure.  With  the  shortcomings 
of  others  he  dealt  gently,  having  too  many 
shortcomings  of  his  own,  as  he  was  accustomed 
to  say,  with  true  humility.  He  did  not,  how 
ever,  look  upon  the  failings  of  his  friends  with 
indifferent  eyes.  "  How  strange  it  is  !"  he  once 
said.  "  We  see  those  whom  we  love  going  to  the 
very  verge  of  the  precipice  of  self-destruction, 
yet  it  is  not  in  our  power  to  hold  them  back ! " 

A  life  of  invalidism  made  consecutive  labor 
of  any  kind  an  impossibility.  For  years  he 
was  only  able  to  write  for  half  an  hour  or  less, 
without  stopping  to  rest,  and  these  precious 
moments  were  devoted  to  some  poem  or  other 
work  for  the  press,  which  was  almost  his  only 
source  of  income.  His  correspondence  suf 
fered,  from  a  literary  point  of  view ;  but  his 
letters  were  none  the  less  delightful  to  his 


268  WHITTIER 

friends.  To  the  world  of  literature  they  are 
perhaps  less  important  than  those  of  most  men 
who  have  achieved  a  high  place. 

Whittier  was  between  twenty  and  thirty  years 
of  age  when  his  family  left  the  little  farm  near 
Haverhill,  where  he  was  born,  and  moved  into  the 
town  of  Amesbury,  eight  miles  distant.  Long 
before  that  period  he  had  identified  himself 
with  the  antislavery  cause,  and  had  visited,  in 
the  course  of  his  ceaseless  labors  for  the  slaves, 
New  York,  Philadelphia,  and  Washington. 
These  brief  journeys  bounded  his  travels  in  this 
world. 

In  the  year  1843  he  wrote  anxiously  to  his 
publisher,  Mr.  Fields,  "I  send  with  this  'The 
Exiles/  a  kind  of  John  Gilpin  legend.  I  am  in 
doubt  about  it.  Read  it,  and  decide  for  thyself 
whether  it  is  worth  printing." 

He  began  at  this  rather  late  period  (he  was 
then  thirty-six  years  old)  to  feel  a  touch  of 
satisfaction  in  his  comparatively  new  occupa 
tion  of  writing  poetry,  and  to  speak  of  it  with 
out  reserve  to  his  chosen  friends.  His  poems 
were  then  beginning  to  bring  him  into  personal 
relation  with  the  reading  world.  Many  years 
later,  when  speaking  of  the  newspaper  writing 
which  absorbed  his  earlier  life,  he  said  that  he 
had  written  a  vast  amount  for  the  press  ;  he 
thought  that  his  work  would  fill  nearly  ten  oc 
tavo  volumes  ;  but  he  had  grown  utterly  weary 


WHITTIER  269 

of  throwing  so  much  out  into  space  from  which 
no  response  ever  came  back  to  him.  At  length 
he  decided  to  put  it  all  aside,  discovering  that 
a  power  lay  in  him  for  more  congenial  labors. 

From  the  moment  of  the  publication  of  his 
second  volume  of  poems,  Whittier  felt  himself 
fairly  launched  upon  a  new  career,  and  seemed 
to  stand  with  a  responsive  audience  before  him. 
The  poems  "Toussaint  L'Ouverture,"  "The 
Slave-Ships,"  and  others  belonging  to  the  same 
period,  followed  in  quick  succession.  Some 
times  they  took  the  form  of  appeal,  sometimes 
of  sympathy,  and  again  they  are  prophetic  or 

dramatic.    He  hears  the  slave  mother  weep: — • 

\ 

"  Gone  —  gone  —  sold  and  gone        \ 
To  the  rice-swamp  dank  and  lone,   V 
From  Virginia's  hills  and  waters  —  \ 
Woe  is  me,  my  stolen  daughters  !  "   ', 

Such  voices  could  not  be  silenced.  Though 
men  might  turn  away  and  refuse  to  read  or  to 
listen,  the  music  once  uttered  rang  out  into  the 
common  air,  and  would  not  die. 

A  homely  native  wit  pointed  Whittier's  fa 
miliar  correspondence.  Writing  in  1849,  while 
revising  his  volume  for  publication,  he  speaks 
of  one  of  his  poems  as  "  that  rascally  old  ballad 
'Kathleen,'"  and  adds  that  it  "wants  some 
thing,  though  it  is  already  too  long."  He  adds  : 
"  The  weather  this  morning  is  cold  enough  for 
an  Esquimau  purgatory  —  terrible.  What  did 
the  old  Pilgrims  mean  by  coming  here  ?  " 


270  WHITTIER 

With  the  years  his  friendship  with  his  pub 
lisher  became  more  intimate.  In  writing  him 
he  often  indulged  his  humor  for  fun  and  banter  : 
"  Bachelor  as  I  am,  I  congratulate  thee  on  thy 
escape  from  single  (misery !)  blessedness.  It 
is  the  very  wisest  thing  thee  ever  did.  Were  I 
autocrat,  I  would  see  to  it  that  every  young  man 
over  twenty-five  and  every  young  woman  over 
twenty  was  married  without  delay.  Perhaps,  on 
second  thought,  it  might  be  well  to  keep  one 
old  maid  and  one  old  bachelor  in  each  town,  by 
way  of  warning,  just  as  the  Spartans  did  their 
drunken  helots." 

Discussing  the  question  of  some  of  his  "  bad 
rhymes,"  and  what  to  do  about  them,  he  wrote 
once  :  "  I  heartily  thank  thee  for  thy  sugges 
tions.  Let  me  have  more  of  them.  I  had  a 
hearty  laugh  at  thy  hint  of  the  '  carnal '  bearing 
of  one  of  my  lines.  It  is  now  simply  rural.  I 
might  have  made  some  other  needful  changes 
had  I  not  been  suffering  with  headache  all 
day." 

Occasionally  the  fire  which  burned  in  him 
would  flame  out,  as  when  he  writes  in  1851  : 
"So  your  Union-tinkers  have  really  caught  a 
'  nigger '  at  last !  A  very  pretty  and  refresh 
ing  sight  it  must  have  been  to  Sabbath-going 
Christians  yesterday  —  that  chained  court-house 
of  yours.  And  Bunker  Hill  Monument  looking 
down  upon  all !  But  the  matter  is  too  sad  for 
irony.  God  forgive  the  miserable  politicians 


WHITTIER  271 

who  gamble  for  office  with  dice  loaded  with 
human  hearts  !  " 

From  time  to  time,  also,  we  find  him  express, 
ing  his  literary  opinions  eagerly  and  simply  as 
friend  may  talk  with  friend,  and  without  aspir 
ing  to  literary  judgment.  "Thoreau's  'Wai- 
den  '  is  capital  reading,  but  very  wicked  and 
heathenish.  The  practical  moral  of  it  seems 
to  be  that  if  a  man  is  willing  to  sink  himself 
into  a  woodchuck  he  can  live  as  cheaply  as 
that  quadruped  ;  but  after  all,  for  me,  I  prefer 
walking  on  two  legs." 

It  would  be  unjust  to  Whittier  to  quote  this 
talk  on  paper  as  his  final  opinion  upon  Tho- 
reau,  for  he  afterwards  read  everything  he  wrote, 
and  was  a  warm  appreciator  of  his  work. 

His  enthusiasm  for  books  and  for  the  writers 
of  books  never  faded.  "What  do  we  not  all 
owe  you,"  he  writes  Mr.  Fields,  "  for  your  edi 
tion  of  De  Tocqueville  !  It  is  one  of  the  best 
books  of  the  century.  Thanks,  too,  for  Ailing- 
ham's  poems.  After  Tennyson,  he  is  my  favor 
ite  among  modern  British  poets." 

And  again  :  "I  have  just  read  Longfellow's 
introduction  to  his  'Tales  of  the  Inn' — a 
splendid  piece  of  painting  !  Neither  Boccaccio 
nor  Chaucer  has  done  better.  Who  wrote  '  A 
Loyal  Woman's  No  ? '  Was  it  Lucy  Larcom  ? 
I  thought  it  might  be." 

In  1866  he  says  :  "I  am  glad  to  see  '  Hosea 
Biglow '  in  book  form.  It  is  a  grand  book  — 


272  WHITTIER 

the  best  of  its  kind  for  the  last  half -century  or 
more.  It  has  wit  enough  to  make  the  reputa 
tion  of  a  dozen  English  satirists." 

This  appreciation  of  his  contemporaries  was 
a  strong  feature  of  his  character.  His  sym 
pathy  with  the  difficulties  of  a  literary  life,  par 
ticularly  for  women,  was  very  keen.  There 
seem  to  be  few  women  writers  of  his  time  who 
have  failed  to  receive  from  his  pen  some  token 
of  recognition.  Of  Edith  Thomas  he  once  said 
in  one  of  his  notelets,  "  She  has  a  divine  gift, 
and  her  first  book  is  more  than  a  promise  — 
an  assurance."  Of  Sarah  Orne  Jewett  he  was 
fond  as  of  a  daughter,  and  from  their  earliest 
acquaintance  his  letters  are  filled  with  appre 
ciation  of  her  stories.  "  I  do  not  wonder,"  he 
wrote  one  day,  "  that  '  The  Luck  of  the  Bogans ' 
is  attractive  to  the  Irish  folks,  and  to  everybody 
else.  It  is  a  very  successful  departure  from 
New1  England  life  and  scenery,  and  shows  that 
Sarah  is  as  much  at  home  in  Ireland  and  on  the 
Carolina  Sea  Islands  as  in  Maine  or  Massachu 
setts.  I  am  very  proud  that  I  was  one  of  the 
first  to  discover  her."  This  predisposition  to 
think  well  of  the  work  of  others  gave  him  the 
happy  opportunity  in  more  than  one  instance  of 
bringing  authors  of  real  talent  before  the  pub 
lic  who  might  otherwise  have  waited  long  for 
general  recognition. 

This  was  especially  the  case  with  one  of  our 
best  beloved  New  England  writers,  Lucy  Lar- 


WHITTIER  273 

com.  As  early  as  1853  he  wrote  a  letter  to  his 
publisher  introducing  her  work  to  his  notice. 
"I  inclose,"  he  says,  "what  I  regard  as  a  very 
unique  and  beautiful  little  book  in  MS.  I  don't 
wish  thee  to  take  my  opinion,  but  the  first  lei 
sure  hour  thee  have,  read  it,  and  I  am  sure  thee 
will  decide  that  it  is  exactly  the  thing  for  pub 
lication.  .  .  .  The  little  prose  poems  are  unlike 
anything  in  our  literature,  and  remind  me  of 
the  German  writer  Lessing.  They  are  equally 
adapted  to  young  and  old.  .  .  .  The  author, 
Lucy  Larcom,  of  Beverly,  is  a  novice  in  writing 
and  book-making,  and  with  no  ambition  to  ap 
pear  in  print ;  and  were  I  not  perfectly  certain 
that  her  little  collection  is  worthy  of  type,  I 
would  be  the  last  to  encourage  her  to  take  even 
this  small  step  to  publicity.  Read  '  The  Im 
pression  of  Rain-drops,'  'The  Steamboat  and 
Niagara,'  'The  Laughing  Water,'  'My  Father's 
House,'  etc." 

He  thus  early  became  the  foster-father  of 
Lucy  Larcom' s  children  of  the  brain,  and, 
what  was  far  more  to  her,  a  life-long  friend, 
adviser,  and  supporter. 

One  of  his  most  intimate  personal  friends 
for  many  years  was  Lydia  Maria  Child.  Be 
ginning  in  the  earliest  days  of  the  anti-slavery 
struggle,  their  friendship  lasted  into  the  late 
and  peaceful  sunset  of  their  days.  As  Mrs. 
Child  advanced  in  years,  it  was  her  custom  in 
the  winter  to  leave  her  cottage  at  Wayland  for 


274  WHITTIER 

a  few  months,  and  to  take  lodgings  in  Boston. 
The  dignity  and  independence  of  Mrs.  Child's 
character  were  so  great  that  she  knew  her 
friends  would  find  her  wherever  she  might  live, 
and  her  desire  to  help  on  the  good  work  of  the 
world  led  her  to  practice  the  most  austere  econ 
omies.  Therefore,  instead  of  finding  a  comfort 
able  boarding-place,  which  she  might  well  have 
excused  herself  for  doing  at  her  advanced  age 
of  eighty  years,  she  took  rooms  in  a  very  plain 
little  house  in  a  remote  quarter  of  the  city,  -and 
went  by  the  street  cars  daily  to  the  North  End, 
to  get  her  dinner  at  a  restaurant  which  she  had 
discovered  as  being  clean,  and  having  whole 
some  food  at  the  very  lowest  prices.  This 
enabled  her  to  give  away  sums  which  were  sur 
prisingly  large  to  those  who  knew  her  income. 
Wendell  Phillips,  who  had  always  taken  charge 
of  her  affairs,  said  to  me  at  the  time  of  her 
death  that  when  the  negroes  made  their  flight 
into  Kansas,  Mrs.  Child  came  in  as  soon  as  the 
news  arrived  and  asked  him  to  forward  fifty 
dollars  for  their  assistance. 

"  I  am  afraid  you  cannot  afford  to  send  that 
sum  just  now,"  said  Mr.  Phillips.  "Perhaps 
you  will  do  well  to  think  it  over." 

"  So  I  will,"  said  Mrs.  Child,  and  departed. 

In  the  course  of  the  day  he  received  a  note 
from  her,  saying  she  had  made  a  mistake*!  It 
was  one  hundred  dollars  that  she  wished  to 
send. 


WHITTIER  275 

Mrs.  Child's  chief  pleasure  in  coming  to  town 
was  the  opportunity  she  found  of  seeing  her 
friends.  Whittier  always  sought  her  out,  and 
their  meetings  at  the  houses  of  their  mutual 
cronies  were  festivals  indeed.  They  would  sit 
side  by  side,  while  memories  crowded  up  and 
filled  their  faces  with  a  tenderness  they  could 
not  express  in  words.  As  they  told  their  tales 
and  made  merry,  they  would  sit  with  their 
hands  on  each  other's  knees,  and  with  glances 
in  which  tears  and  laughter  were  closely  inter 
mingled. 

"  It  was  good  to  see  Mrs.  Child,"  some  one 
remarked,  after  one  of  those  interviews. 

"Yes,"  said  Whittier,  "  Lyddy's  bunnets 
are  n't  always  in  the  fashion  "  (with  a  quaint 
look,  as  much  as  to  say,  "  I  wonder  what  you 
think  of  anything  so  bad  "),  "  but  we  don't  like 
her  any  the  worse  for  that." 

Shortly  after  Mrs.  Child's  death  he  wrote 
from  Amesbury  :  "  My  heart  has  been  heavy 
ever  since  I  heard  of  dear  Maria  Child's  death. 
The  true,  noble,  loving  soul !  Where  is  she  ? 
What  is  she  ?  How  is  she  ?  The  moral  and 
spiritual  economy  of  God  will  not  suffer  such 
light  and  love  to  be  lost  in  blank  annihilation. 
She  was  herself  an  evidence  of  immortality. 
In  a  letter  written  to  me  at  seventy  years  of 
age  she  said:  'The  older  I  grow  the  more  I 
am  awe-struck  (not  frightened,  but  awed)  by 
the  great  mystery  of  an  existence  here  and 


276  WHITTIER 

hereafter.  No  thinking  can  solve  the  problem. 
Infinite  wisdom  has  purposely  sealed  it  from 
our  eyes.' ' 

There  was  never  a  moment  of  Whittier's  life 
when,  prostrated  by  illness,  or  overwhelmed  by 
private  sorrows,  or  removed  from  the  haunts 
of  men,  he  forgot  to  take  a  living  interest  in 
public  affairs,  and  to  study  closely  the  charac 
teristics  and  works  of  the  men  who  were  our 
governors.  He  understood  the  characters  of 
our  public  officers  as  if  he  had  lived  with  them 
continually,  and  his  quick  apprehension  with 
regard  to  their  movements  was  something  most 
unusual.  De  Quincey,  we  remember,  surprised 
his  American  friends  by  taking  their  hands,  as 
it  were,  and  showing  them  about  Boston,  so 
familiar  was  he  with  our  localities.  Whittier 
could  sit  down  with  politicians  and  easily  prove 
himself  the  better  man  on  contested  questions. 
In  1 86 1  he  wrote  :  — 

"  Our  government  needs  more  wisdom  than 
it  has  thus  far  had  credit  for  to  sustain  the 
national  honor  and  avert  a  war  with  England. 
What  a  pity  that  Welles  indorsed  the  act  of 
Wilkes  in  his  report !  Why  could  n't  we  have 
been  satisfied  with  the  thing  without  making 
such  a  cackling  over  it  ?  Apologies  are  cheap, 
and  we  could  afford  to  make  a  very  handsome 
one  in  this  case.  A  war  with  England  would 
ruin  us.  It  is  too  monstrous  to  think  of.  May 
God  in  His  mercy  save  us  from  it ! " 


WHITTIER  277 

In  1862  and  1863  Whittier  was  in  frequent 
correspondence  with  Mr.  Fields.  Poems  sug 
gested  by  the  stirring  times  were  crowding 
thick  upon  his  mind.  "It  is  a  great  thing  to 
live  in  these  days.  I  am  thankful  for  what  I 
have  lived  to  see  and  hear,"  he  says.  "There 
is  nothing  for  us  but  the  old  Methodist  ejacula 
tion,  '  Glory  to  God  ! '" 

The  volume  entitled  "In  War-time"  ap 
peared  at  this  period,  though,  as  usual,  he 
seems  to  have  had  little  strength  and  spirit  for 
the  revision  of  his  poems.  For  this,  however 
unwillingly,  he  would  often  throw  himself  upon 
the  kindness  of  his  friend  and  publisher. 

In  writing  to  ask  some  consideration  for  the 
manuscript  of  an  unknown  lady  during  this 
year,  he  adds  :  "  I  ought  to  have  sent  to  you 
about  this  lady's  MS.  long  ago,  but  the  fact  is, 
I  hate  to  bother  you  with  such  matters.  I  am 
more  and  more  impressed  with  the  Christian 
tolerance  and  patience  of  publishers,  beset  as 
you  are  with  legions  of  clamorous  authors,  male 
and  female.  I  should  think  you  would  hate 
the  very  sight  of  one  of  these  importunates. 
After  all,  Fields,  let  us  own  the  truth  :  writing 
folks  are  bores.  How  few  of  us  (let  them  say 
what  they  will  of  our  genius)  have  any  com 
mon  sense  !  I  take  it  that  it  is  the  providential 
business  of  authors  and  publishers  to  torment 
each  other." 

These  little  friendly  touches   in  his  corre- 


278  WHITTIER 

spondence  show  us  the  man  far  more  dis 
tinctly  than  many  pages  of  writing  about  him. 
Some  one  has  said  that  Whittier's  epistolary 
style  was  perfect.  Doubtless  he  could  write 
as  good  a  letter  on  occasion  as  any  man  who 
ever  lived,  but  he  sustained  no  such  corre 
spondence.  His  notes  and  letters  were  homely 
and  affectionate,  with  the  delightful  careless 
ness  possible  in  the  talk  of  intimate  friends. 
They  present  no  ordinary  picture  of  human 
tenderness,  devotion,  and  charity,  and-  these 
qualities  gain  a  wonderful  beauty  when  we  re 
member  that  they  come  from  the  same  spirit 
which  cried  out  with  Ezekiel :  — 

"  The  burden  of  a  prophet's  power 
Fell  on  me  in  that  fearful  hour ; 
From  off  unutterable  woes 
The  curtain  of  the  future  rose  ; 
I  saw  far  down  the  coming  time 
The  fiery  chastisement  of  crime ; 
With  noise  of  mingling  hosts,  and  jar 
Of  falling  towers  and  shouts  of  war, 
I  saw  the  nations  rise  and  fall 
Like  fire-gleams  on  my  tent's  white  wall." 

"The  fire  and  fury  of  the  brain"  were  his 
indeed ;  a  spirit  was  in  him  to  redeem  the  land ; 
he  was  one  of  God's  interpreters  ;  but  there 
was  also  the  tenderness  of  divine  humanity,  the 
love  and  patience  of  those  who  dwell  in  the 
courts  of  the  Lord. 

Whittier's  sister  Elizabeth  was  a  sensitive 
woman,  whose  delicate  health  was  a  constant 


WHITTIER  279 

source  of  anxiety  to  her  brother,  especially 
after  the  death  of  their  mother,  when  they 
were  left  alone  together  in  the  home  at  Ames- 
bury.  As  one  of  their  intimate  friends  said,  no 
one  could  tell  which  would  die  first,  but  they 
were  each  so  anxious  about  the  other's  health 
that  it  was  a  question  which  would  wear  away 
into  the  grave  first,  for  the  other's  sake. 

It  was  Whittier's  sad  experience  to  be  de 
prived  of  the  companionship  of  all  those  most 
dear  to  him,  and  for  over  twenty  years  to  live 
without  that  intimate  household  communion  for 
the  loss  of  which  the  world  holds  no  recom 
pense.  For  several  years,  before  and  after  his 
sister  Elizabeth's  death,  Whittier  wore  the  look 
of  one  who  was  very  ill.  His  large  dark  eyes 
burned  with  peculiar  fire,  and  contrasted  with 
his  pale  brow  and  attenuated  figure.  He  had 
a  sorrowful,  stricken  look,  and  found  it  hard 
enough  to  reconstruct  his  life,  missing  the  com 
panionship  and  care  of  his  sister,  and  her  great 
sympathy  with  his  own  literary  work.  There 
was  a  likeness  between  the  two ;  the  same 
speaking  eyes  marked  the  line  from  which  they 
sprang,  and  their  kinship  and  inheritance.  Old 
New  England  people  were  quick  to  recognize 
"  the  Bachiler  eyes,"  not  only  in  the  Whit- 
tiers,  but  in  Daniel  Webster,  Caleb  Gushing, 
Nathaniel  Hawthorne,  and  William  Bachiler 
Greene,  a  man  less  widely  known  than  these 
distinguished  compatriots.  Mr.  Greene  was, 


280  WHITTIER 

however,  a  man  of  mark  in  his  own  time,  a 
daring  thinker,  and  one  who  was  possessed 
of  much  brave  originality,  whose  own  deep 
thoughtfulness  was  always  planting  seeds  of 
thought  in  others,  and  who  can  certainly  never 
be  forgotten  by  those  who  were  fortunate 
enough  to  be  his  friends. 

These  men  of  the  grand  eyes  were  all  de 
scended  from  a  gifted  old  preacher  of  great 
fame  in  early  colonial  days,  a  man  of  true  dis 
tinction  and  devoted  service,  in  spite  of  the  dis 
honor  with  which  he  let  his  name  be  shadowed 
in  his  latest  years.  It  would  be  most  interest 
ing  to  trace  the  line  still  further  back  into  the 
past ;  but  when  the  Bachiler  eyes  were  by  any 
chance  referred  to  in  Whittier's  presence,  he 
would  look  shyly  askance,  and  sometimes  speak, 
half  with  pride,  half  with  a  sort  of  humorous 
compassion,  of  his  Hampton  ancestor.  The 
connection  of  the  Whittiers  of  Haverhill  with 
the  Greenes  was  somewhat  closer  than  with 
other  branches  of  the  Bachiler  line.  One  of 
the  poet's  most  entertaining  reminiscences  of 
his  boyhood  was  the  story  of  his  first  visit  to 
Boston.  Mr.  William  Greene's  mother  was  an 
interesting  woman  of  strong,  independent  char 
acter  and  wide  interests,  wonted  to  the  life  of 
cities,  and  one  of  the  first,  in  spite  of  his  boy 
ish  shyness,  to  appreciate  her  young  relative. 
Her  kind  eagerness,  during  one  of  her  occa 
sional  visits  to  the  Whittiers,  that  Greenleaf 


WHITTIER  281 

should  come  to  see  her  when  he  came  to  Bos 
ton,  fell  in  with  his  own  dreams,  and  a  high 
desire  to  see  the  sights  of  the  great  town. 

One  can  easily  see  how  his  imagination  glori 
fied  the  natural  expectations  of  a  country  boy, 
and  when  the  time  arrived  how  the  whole 
household  lent  itself  to  furthering  so  great  an 
expedition.  He  was  not  only  to  have  a  new 
suit  of  clothes,  but  they  were,  for  the  first 
time,  to  be  trimmed  with  "boughten  buttons," 
to  the  lad's  complete  satisfaction,  his  mind 
being  fixed  upon  those  as  marking  the  dif 
ference  between  town  and  country  fashions. 
When  the  preparations  were  made,  his  fresh 
homespun  costume,  cut  after  the  best  usage  of 
the  Society  of  Friends,  seemed  to  him  all  that 
heart  could  desire,  and  he  started  away  bravely 
by  the  coach  to  pass  a  week  in  Boston.  His 
mother  had  not  forgotten  to  warn  him  of  possi 
ble  dangers  and  snares  ;  it  was  then  that  he 
made  her  a  promise  which,  at  first  from  princi 
ple  and  later  from  sentiment,  he  always  most 
sacredly  kept  —  that  he  would  not  enter  a  play 
house.  As  he  told  the  story,  it  was  easy  for  a 
listener  to  comprehend  how  many  good  wishes 
flew  after  the  adventurer,  and  how  much  wild 
beating  of  the  heart  he  himself  experienced  as 
the  coach  rolled  away  ;  how  bewildering  the 
city  streets  appeared  when  he  found  himself  at 
the  brief  journey's  end.  After  he  had  reported 
himself  to  Mrs.  Greene,  and  been  received  with 


282  WHITTIER 

most  affectionate  hospitality,  and  had  promised 
to  reappear  at  tea-time,  he  sallied  forth  to  the 
great  business  of  sight-seeing. 

"  I  wandered  up  and  down  the  streets,"  he 
used  to  say.  "  Somehow  it  wasn't  just  what  I 
expected,  and  the  crowd  was  worse  and  worse 
after  I  got  into  Washington  Street ;  and  when 
I  got  tired  of  being  jostled,  it  seemed  to  me  as 
if  the  folks  might  get  by  if  I  waited  a  little 
while.  Some  of  them  looked  at  me,  and  so  I 
stepped  into  an  alleyway  and  waited  and  looked 
out.  Sometimes  there  didn't  seem  to  be  so 
many  passing,  and  I  thought  of  starting,  and 
then  they'd  begin  again.  'T  was  a  terrible 
stream  of  people  to  me.  I  began  to  think  my 
new  clothes  and  the  buttons  were  all  thrown 
away.  I  stayed  there  a  good  while."  (This 
was  said  with  great  amusement.)  "  I  began 
to  be  homesick.  I  thought  it  made  no  differ 
ence  at  all  about  my  having  those  boughten 
buttons." 

How  long  he  waited,  or  what  thoughts  were 
stirred  by  this  first  glimpse  at  the  ceaseless 
procession  of  humanity,  who  can  say  ?  But 
there  was  a  sequel  to  the  tale.  He  was  in 
vited  to  return  to  Mrs.  Greene's  to  drink  tea 
and  meet  a  company  of  her  guests.  Among 
them  were  some  ladies  who  were  very  gay  and 
friendly  ;  we  can  imagine  that  they  were  at 
tracted  by  the  handsome  eyes  and  quaint  garb 
of  the  young  Friend,  and  by  his  quick  wit  and 


WHITTIER  283 

homely  turns  of  speech,  all  the  more  amusing 
for  a  rustic  flavor.  They  tried  to  tease  him  a 
little,  but  they  must  have  quickly  found  their 
match  in  drollery,  while  the  lad  was  already 
a  citizen  of  the  commonwealth  of  books.  No 
doubt  the  stimulus  of  such  a  social  occasion 
brought  him,  as  well  as  the  strangers,  into  new 
acquaintance  with  his  growing  gifts.  But  pres 
ently  one  of  the  ladies,  evidently  the  favorite 
until  this  shocking  moment,  began  to  speak  of 
the  theatre,  and  asked  for  the  pleasure  of  his 
presence  at  the  play  that  very  night,  she  her 
self  being  the  leading  player.  At  this  disclos 
ure,  and  the  frank  talk  of  the  rest  of  the  com 
pany,  their  evident  interest  in  the  stage,  and 
regard  for  a  young  person  who  had  chosen  such 
a  profession,  the  young  Quaker  lad  was  stricken 
with  horror.  In  after  years  he  could  only 
remember  it  with  amusement,  but  that  night 
his  mother's  anxious  warnings  rang  in  his  ears, 
and  he  hastened  to  escape  from  such  a  snare. 
Somehow  this  pleasant  young  companion  of  the 
tea  party  hardly  represented  the  wickedness  of 
playhouses  as  Puritan  New  England  loved  to 
picture  them  ;  but  between  a  sense  of  disap 
pointment  and  homesickness  and  general  inse 
curity,  he  could  not  sleep,  and  next  morning 
when  the  early  stage-coach  started  forth,  it  car 
ried  him  as  passenger.  He  said  nothing  to 
his  amazed  family  of  the  alarming  episode  of 
the  playing-woman,  nor  of  his  deep  conscious- 


284  WHITTIER 

ness  of  the  home-made  clothes,  but  he  no  doubt 
reflected  much  upon  this  Boston  visit  in  the 
leisure  of  the  silent  fields  and  hills. 

It  is  impossible  to  convey  to.  those  who 
never  saw  Mr.  Whittier  the  charm  of  his  gift 
of  story  telling ;  the  exactness  and  simplicity 
of  his  reminiscences  were  flavored  by  his  poeti 
cal  insight  and  dramatic  representation.  It  was 
a  wonderful  thing  to  hear  him  rehearse  in  the 
twilight  the  scenes  of  his  youth,  and  the  figures 
that  came  and  went  in  that  small  world  ;  the 
pathos  and  humor  of  his  speech  can  never  be 
exceeded ;  and  there  can  never  be  again  so 
complete  a  linking  of  the  ancient  provincial  lore 
and  the  new  life  and  thought  of  New  England 
as  there  was  in  him.  While  he  was  with  us, 
his  poems  seemed  hardly  to  give  sufficient  wit 
ness  of  that  rich  store  of  thought  and  know 
ledge  ;  he  was  always  making  his  horizon  wider, 
at  the  same  time  that  he  came  into  closer  sym 
pathy  with  things  near  at  hand.  For  him  the 
ancient  customs  of  a  country  neighborhood,  the 
simple  characters,  the  loves  and  hates  and  losses 
of  a  rural  household,  stood  for  a  type  of  human 
life  in  every  age,  and  were  never  trivial  or  nar 
row.  As  he  grew  older,  these  became  less  and 
less  personal.  He  sometimes  appeared  to  think 
of  death  rather  than  the  person  who  had  died, 
and  of  love  and  grief  rather  than  of  those  who 
felt  their  influence.  His  was  the  life  of  the 
poet  first  of  all,  and  yet  the  tale  of  his  sympa- 


WHITTIER  285 

thetic  friendliness,  and  his  generosities  and  care- 
taking  for  others  will  never  be  fully  told.  The 
dark  eyes  had  great  powers  of  insight ;  they 
could  flash  scorn  as  well  as  shine  with  the  soft 
light  of  encouragement. 

He  accustomed  himself,  of  course,  to  more 
frequent  visits  to  Boston  after  his  sister's  death, 
but  he  was  seldom,  if  ever,  persuaded  to  go 
to  the  Saturday  Club,  to  which  so  many  of  his 
friends  belonged.  Sometimes  he  would  bring 
a  new  poem  for  a  private  first  reading,  and  for 
that  purpose  would  stay  to  breakfast  or  lunch 
eon  ;  but  late  dinners  were  contrary  to  the  habit 
of  his  life,  and  he  seldom  sat  down  to  one. 

"  I  take  the  liberty,"  he  wrote  one  day,  "  of 
inclosing  a  little  poem  of  mine  which  has  be 
guiled  some  weary  hours.  I  hope  thee  will  like 
it.  How  strange  it  seems  not  to  read  it  to  my 
sister !  If  thee  have  read  Schoolcraft,  thee  will 
remember  what  he  says  of  the  'Little  Van- 
ishers.'  The  legend  is  very  beautiful,  and  I 
hope  I  have  done  it  justice  in  some  sort." 

In  the  spring  of  1865  he  came  to  Campton, 
on  the  Pemigewasset  River,  in  New  Hamp 
shire,  a  delightful  place  for  those  who  love  green 
hills  and  the  mystery  of  rivers. 

We  were  passing  a  few  weeks  there  by  our 
selves,  and  it  was  a  great  surprise  and  pleasure 
to  see  our  friend.  He  drove  up  to  the  door  one 
afternoon  just  as  the  sun  was  slanting  to  the 


286  WHITTIER 

west,  too  late  to  drive  away  again  that  day.  In 
our  desire  to  show  him  all  the  glories  of  the 
spot,  we  carried  him  out  at  once,  up  the  hill 
side,  leaping  across  the  brook,  gathering  penny 
royal  and  Indian  posy  as  we  went,  past  the 
sheep  and  on  and  up,  until  he,  laughing,  said : 
"  Look  here,  I  can't  follow  thee ;  besides,  I 
think  I've  seen  more  of  this  life  than  thee  have, 
and  it  isn  't  all  so  new  to  me !  Come  and  sit 
down  here  ;  I  'm  tired."  We  sat  a  while  over 
looking  the  wonderful  panorama,  the  winding 
river,  the  hills  and  fields  all  green  and  radiant, 
listening  at  times  to  a  mountain  stream  which 
came  with  wild  and  solitary  roar  from  its  sol 
emn  home  among  the  farther  heights.  Pres 
ently  we  returned  to  supper  ;  and  afterwards, 
sitting  in  the  little  parlor  which  looked  towards 
the  sunset  on  the  high  hills  far  away,  his  mind 
seemed  to  rise  into  a  higher  atmosphere.  He 
began  by  quoting  the  last  verse  of  Emerson's 
"Sphinx:"  — 

"  Uprose  the  merry  Sphinx, 

And  couched  no  more  in  stone  ; 
She  melted  into  purple  cloud, 

She  silvered  in  the  moon  ; 
She  spired  into  a  yellow  flame  ; 

She  flowered  in  blossoms  red; 
She  flowed  into  a  foaming  wave ; 

She  stood  Monadnock's  head." 

He  talked  long  and  earnestly  upon  the  sub 
ject  of  our  spiritual  existence  independent  of 
the  body.  I  have  often  heard  him  dwell  upon 


WHITTIER  287 

this  subj  ect  since ;  but  the  awful  glory  of  the 
hills,  the  dark  and  silence  of  our  little  parlor, 
the  assured  speech  touching  the  unseen,  of 
one  who  had  thought  much  and  suffered  much, 
and  found  a  refuge  in  the  tabernacle  not  made 
with  hands,  were  very  impressive.  We  felt 
that  "  it  was  good  for  us  to  be  there." 

Speaking  of  his  faith  in  the  visions  of  others 

—  though  he  did  not  have  these  visions  him 
self,  and  believed  they  were  not  vouchsafed  to 
all  —  he  told  us  of  a  prophecy  that  was  written 
down  twenty-five  years  before  by  an  old  man 
in  Sandwich  (a  village  among  the  hills,  about 
fifteen  miles  from  Campton),  predicting  the  ter 
rible  civil  war  which  had  just  been  raging  be 
tween  the  North  and  the  South.     This  man 
was  in  the  fields  at  noonday,  when  a  darkness 
fell  upon  his  sight  and  covered  the  earth.     He 
beheld  the  divided  nation  and  the  freed  people 
and  the  final  deliverance  from  the  terrors  of 
war.     The  whole  series  of  events  were  clearly 
detailed,  and  Whittier  had  stored  them  away  in 
his  memory.     He  said  that  only  one  thing  was 
wrong.     He  foretold  foreign  intervention,  from 
which  we  were  happily  spared.     The  daughter 
of  this  prophet  was  living ;  he  knew  her  well. 

—  an  excellent  woman  and  a  Friend  who  was 
often  impressed  to  speak  in  meeting.     "  She  is 
good,"  said  Whittier,  "and  speaks  from  her  ex 
perience,  and  for  that  reason  I  like  to  hear  her." 

Spiritualism,  as  it  is  called  in  our  day,  was  a 


288  WHITTIER 

subject  which  earnestly  and  steadily  held  his 
attention.  Having  lived  very  near  to  the  Salem 
witchcraft  experience  in  early  times,  the  topic 
was  one  that  came  more  closely  home  to  his 
mind  than  to  almost  any  one  else  in  our  cen 
tury.  There  are  many  passages  in  his  letters 
on  this  question  which  state  his  own  mental 
position  very  clearly. 

"  I  have  had  as  good  a  chance  to  see  a 
ghost,"  he  once  said,  "as  anybody  ever  had, 
but  not  the  slightest  sign  ever  came  to  me.  I 
do  not  doubt  what  others  tell  me,  but  I  some 
times  wonder  over  my  own  incapacity.  I  should 
like  to  see  some  dear  ghost  walk  in  and  sit  down 
by  me  when  I  am  here  alone.  The  doings  of 
the  old  witch  days  have  never  been  explained  ; 
and  as  we  are  so  soon  to  be  transferred  to  an 
other  state,  how  natural  it  appears  that  some  of 
us  should  have  glimpses  of  it  here  !  We  all  feel 
the  help  we  receive  from  the  Divine  Spirit. 
Why  deny,  then,  that  some  men  have  it  more 
directly  and  more  visibly  than  others  ?  " 

In  his  memories  of  New  England  country  life 
when  he  was  a  child,  this  subject  was  closely 
interwoven  with  every  association.  He  had  an 
uncle,  who  made  one  of  the  family,  a  man  by 
no  means  devoid  of  the  old-fashioned  faith  in 
witches,  and  who  was  always  ready  to  give  his 
testimony.  He  remembered  an  old  woman  in 
the  neighborhood  who  was  accused  of  being  a 
witch,  and  that  when  his  uncle's  opinion  was 


WHITTIER  289^ 

asked  about  her,  he  replied  that  he  knew  she 
was  a  witch. 

"  How  do  you  know  ?  "  they  said. 

"Oh,"  he  replied,  "  I  Ve  seen  her !  " 

Whittier  recalled  this  uncle's  returning  one 
night  from  a  long  drive  through  the  woods  ; 
and  when  he  came  in  and  sat  down  by  the  fire 
after  supper,  he  told  them  that  he  had  seen 
three  old  women  in  a  clearing  around  a  kettle, 
"  a-stirrin'  of  it."  When  they  saw  him,  they 
moved  off  behind  the  trees,  but  he  distinctly 
saw  the  smoke  from  the  kettle,  and  he  recog 
nized  the  old  woman  in  question  as  one  of  the 
three  beyond  the  shadow  of  a  doubt.  No  doubt 
some  curious  rustic  remedy  or  charm  was  being 
brewed  in  the  dark  of  the  moon.  Nothing  es 
caped  his  observation  that  was  printed  or  circu 
lated  upon  this  topic.  In  the  summer  of  1882 
he  discovered  that  Old  Orchard  Beach  had  been 

made  a  theatre  of  new  wonders.  Dr. had 

been  there,  "  working  Protestant  miracles,  and 
the  lame  walk  and  the  deaf  hear  under  his  ma 
nipulation  and  holy  oil.  There  seems  no  doubt 
that  cures  of  nervous  diseases  are  really  some 
times  effected,  and  I  believe  in  the  efficacy  of 
prayer.  The  nearer  we  are  drawn  to  Him  who 
is  the  source  of  all  life,  the  better  it  must  be  for 
soul  and  body." 

In  Robert  Dale  Owen  he  always  took  a 
strong  and  friendly  interest  ;  and  when,  late  in 
life,  reverses  fell  upon  Mr.  Owen  in  the  shape  of 


2QO  WHITTIER 

humiliating  revelations  of  his  own  credulity, 
Whittier's  relations  to  him  were  unchanged.  "  I 
have  read  with  renewed  interest,"  he  wrote, 
"  the  paper  of  R.  D.  Owen.  I  had  a  long  talk 
with  him  years  ago  on  the  subject.  He  was  a 
very  noble  and  good  man,  and  I  was  terribly 
indignant  when  he  was  so  deceived  by  the  pre 
tended  materialized  '  Katie  King/  I  could  never 
quite  believe  in  '  materialization/  as  I  had  rea 
son  to  know  that  much  of  it  was  fraudulent.  It 
surely  argues  a  fathomless  depth  of  depravity  to 
trifle  with  the  yearning  love  of  those  who  have 
lost  dear  ones,  and  *  long  for  the  touch  of  a  van 
ished  hand/  " 

In  the  year  1866  a  very  fine  portrait  of  Abra 
ham  Lincoln  was  engraved  by  Marshall.  A 
copy  of  it  was  presented  to  Whittier,  who  wrote 
concerning  it :  "  It  was  never  my  privilege  to 
know  Abraham  Lincoln  personally,  and  the 
various  pictures  have  more  or  less  failed  to  sat 
isfy  my  conception  of  him.  They  might  be, 
and  probably  were,  what  are  called  '  good  like 
nesses/  so  far  as  outline  and  detail  were  con 
cerned  ;  but  to  me  they  always  seemed  to  lack 
one  great  essential  of  a  true  portrait,  —  the  in 
forming  spirit  of  the  man  within.  This  I  find 
in  Marshall's  portrait.  The  old  harsh  lines  and 
unmistakable  mouth  are  there,  without  flattery 
or  compromise  ;  but  over  all  and  through  all 
the  pathetic  sadness,  the  wise  simplicity  and 


WHITTIER  291 

tender  humanity  of  the  man  are  visible.  It  is 
the  face  of  the  speaker  at  Gettysburg,  and  the 
writer  of  the  second  inaugural." 

It  was  during  this  year,  also,  that  the  "  Tent 
on  the  Beach  "  was  written.  He  had  said  again 
and  again  in  his  notes  that  he  had  this  work 
in  hand,  but  always  declared  he  was  far  too  ill 
to  finish  it  during  the  year.  Nevertheless,  in 
the  last  days  of  December  the  package  was  for 
warded  to  his  publisher.  "Tell  me,"  he  wrote, 
"if  thee  object  to  the  personal  character  of  it. 
I  have  represented  thee  and  Bayard  Taylor  and 
myself  living  a  wild  tent  life  for  a  few  summer 
days  on  the  beach,  where,  for  lack  of  some 
thing  better,  I  read  my  stories  to  the  others. 
My  original  plan  was  the  old  « Decameron '  one, 
each  personage  to  read  his  own  poems ;  but 
the  thing  has  been  so  hackneyed  by  repetition 
that  I  abandoned  it  in  disgust,  and  began  anew. 
The  result  is  before  thee.  Put  it  in  type  or 
the  fire.  I  am  content  —  like  Eugene  Aram, 
'prepared  for  either  fortune.'  " 

He  had  intended  also  to  accomplish  some 
work  in  prose  at  this  period,  but  the  painful 
condition  of  his  health  forbade  it.  "  I  am  for 
bidden  to  use  my  poor  head,"  he  said,  "so  I 
have  to  get  along  as  I  can  without  it.  The 
Catholic  St.  Leon,  thee  knows,  walked  alert  as 
usual  after  his  head  was  cut  off." 

I  am  tempted  to  quote  still  further  from  a 
letter  of  this  period  :  "  I  inclose  a  poem  of 


292  WHITTIER 

mine  which  has  never  seen  the  light,  although 
it  was  partly  in  print  from  my  first  draft  to 
spare  me  the  trouble  of  copying.  It  presents 
my  view  of  Christ  as  the  special  manifestation 
of  the  love  of  God  to  humanity.  .  .  .  Let  me 
thank  the  publisher  of  Milton's  prose  for  the 
compliment  of  the  dedication.  Milton's  prose 
has  long  been  my  favorite  reading.  My  whole 
life  has  felt  the  influence  of  his  writings." 

There  is  a  delightful  note  on  the  subject  of 
the  popularity  of  the  "Tent  on  the  -Beach," 
which  shows  his  natural  pleasure  in  success. 
"Think,"  he  says,  "of  bagging  in  this  tent  of 
ours  an  unsuspecting  public  at  the  rate  of  a 
thousand  a  day  !  This  will  never  do.  The 
swindle  is  awful.  Barnum  is  a  saint  to  us.  I 
am  bowed  with  a  sense  of  guilt,  ashamed  to 
look  an  honest  man  in  the  face.  But  Neme 
sis  is  on  our  track  ;  somebody  will  puncture 
our  tent  yet,  and  it  will  collapse  like  a  torn  bal 
loon.  I  know  I  shall  have  to  catch  it ;  my 
back  tingles  in  anticipation." 

It  was  perhaps  in  this  same  year,  1866,  that 
we  made  an  autumn  visit  to  Whittier  which  is 
still  a  well-remembered  pleasure.  The  weather 
was  warm  and  the  fruit  was  ripening  in  the 
little  Amesbury  garden.  We  loitered  about  for 
a  while,  I  remember,  in  the  afternoon,  among 
the  falling  pear  leaves  and  in  the  sweet  air,  but 
he  soon  led  the  way  into  his  garden-room,  and 


WHITTIER  293 

fell  into  talk.  He  was  an  adept  in  the  art  of 
conversation,  having  trained  himself  in  the  dif 
ficult  school  of  a  New  England  farmhouse,  fit 
ground  for  such  athletics,  being  typically  bare 
of  suggestion  and  of  relief  from  outside  re 
sources.  The  unbroken  afternoons  and  the 
long  evenings,  when  the  only  hope  of  enter 
tainment  is  in  such  fire  as  one  brain  can  strike 
from  another,  produce  a  situation  as  difficult 
to  the  unskilled  as  that  of  an  untaught  swim 
mer  when  first  cast  into  the  sea.  Persons  long 
habituated  to  these  contests  could  face  the 
position  calmly,  and  see  the  early  "  tea-things  " 
disappear  and  the  contestants  draw  their  chairs 
around  the  fire  with  a  kind  of  zeal ;  but  to  one 
new  to  such  experience  there  was  room  for 
heart-sinkings  when  preparations  were  made, 
by  putting  fresh  sticks  on  the  fire,  for  sitting 
from  gloaming  to  vespers,  and  sometimes  on 
again  unwearied  till  midnight. 

Mrs.  Stowe  and  Whittier  were  the  invincible 
Lancelots  of  these  tourneys,  and  any  one  who 
has  had  the  privilege  of  sitting  by  the  New 
England  hearthstone  with  either  of  them  will 
be  ready  to  confess  that  no  playhouse,  or  game, 
or  any  of  the  distractions  the  city  may  afford, 
can  compare  with  the  satisfaction  of  such  an 
experience.  Upon  the  visit  in  question  Whit- 
tier  talked  of  the  days  of  his  anti-slavery  life  in 
1835  or  ^36,  when  the  English  agitator,  George 
Thompson,  first  came  to  this  country.  The 


294  WHITTIER 

latter  was  suffering  from  the  attack  of  many  a 
mob,  and  was  fatigued  by  frequent  speaking 
and  as  frequent  abuse.  Whittier  invited  him 
to  his  home  in  the  neighborhood  of  Haver- 
hill,  where  he  could  find  quiet  and  rest  during 
the  warm  weather.  Thompson  accepted  the  in 
vitation,  and  remained  with  him  a  fortnight. 
They  used  to  rake  hay  together,  and  go  about 
the  farm  unmolested.  At  length,  however,  a 
pressing  invitation  came  for  Thompson  to  go 
to  Concord,  New  Hampshire,  to  speak  in  the 
cause  of  freedom,  and  afterwards  to  continue 
on  to  the  village  of  Plymouth  and  visit  a  friend 
in  that  place.  Whittier  was  included  in  the  in 
vitation,  and  it  was  settled  that  they  should  ac 
cept  the  call.  They  traveled  peaceably  enough 
in  their  own  chaise  as  far  as  Concord,  where 
the  speech  was  delivered  without  interruption  ; 
but  when  they  attempted  to  leave  the  hall  after 
the  address  was  ended,  they  found  it  almost 
impossible.  A  crowd  followed  them  with  the 
apparent  intention  of  stoning  and  killing  them. 
"  I  understood  how  St.  Paul  felt  when  he  was 
thrice  stoned,"  said  Whittier.  The  missiles 
fell  around  them  and  upon  them  like  hail,  not 
touching  their  heads,  providentially,  although 
he  could  still  remember  the  sound  of  the  stones 
when  they  missed  their  aim  and  struck  the 
wooden  fence  behind  them.  They  were  made 
very  lame  by  the  blows,  but  they  managed 
to  reach  their  friend's  house,  where  they 


WHITTIER  295 

sprang  up  the  steps  three  at  a  time,  before  the 
crowd  knew  where  they  were  going.  Their 
host  was  certainly  a  brave  man,  for  he  took 
them  in  at  the  door,  and  then  throwing  it  open, 
exclaimed,  "  Whoever  comes  in  here  must  come 
over  my  dead  body."  The  door  was  then  bar 
ricaded,  and  the  crowd  rushed  round  to  the 
back  of  the  house,  thinking  that  their  victims 
intended  to  go  out  that  way  ;  but  the  travelers 
waited  until  it  was  dark,  when  Whittier  ex 
changed  his  Friend's  hat  for  that  of  his  host, 
and,  everything  else  peculiar  about  his  dress  be 
ing  well  disguised,  the  two  managed  to  pass  out 
unperceived  by  the  crowd,  and  go  on  their  way 
to  Plymouth.  They  stopped  one  night  on  their 
journey  at  a  small  inn,  where  the  landlord 
asked  if  they  had  heard  anything  of  the  riot 
in  Concord.  Two  men  had  been  there,  he  said, 
one  an  Englishman  by  the  name  of  Thompson, 
who  had  been  making  abominable  and  seditious 
speeches,  stirring  up  people  about  "the  nig 
gers  ; "  the  other  was  a  young  Quaker  by  the 
name  of  Whittier,  who  was  always  making 
speeches.  He  heard  him  lecture  once  himself, 
he  said  (a  base  lie,  Whittier  told  us,  because 
he  had  never  "lectured  "  in  his  life),  and  it  was 
well  that  active  measures  had  been  taken 
against  them.  "We  heard  him  all  through," 
said  Whittier ;  "and  then,  just  as  I  had  my  foot 
on  the  step  of  the  chaise,  ready  to  drive  away 
from  the  door,  I  remarked  to  him,  '  Would  n't 


296  WHITTIER 

you  like  to  see  that  Thompson  of  whom  you 
have  been  speaking  ? '  I  took  good  care  not 
to  use  ' plain'  language  (that  is,  the  Quaker 
form).  'I  rather  think  I  should/  said  the  man. 
'  Well,  this  is  Mr.  Thompson/  I  said,  as  I 
jumped  into  the  chaise.  '  And  this  is  the 
Quaker,  Whittier/  said  Thompson,  driving 
away  as  fast  as  he  could.  I  looked  back,  and 
saw  him  standing,  mouth  wide  open,  gazing 
after  us  in  the  greatest  astonishment." 

The  two  kept  on  to  Plymouth,  where  they 
were  nearly  mobbed  a  second  time.  Years 
after,  Whittier  said  that  once  when  he  was 
passing  through  Portland,  a  man,  seeing  him  go 
by,  stepped  out  of  his  shop  and  asked  if  his 
name  were  Whittier,  and  if  he  were  not  the 
man  who  was  stoned,  years  before,  by  a  mob  at 
Concord.  The  answer  being  in  the  affirmative, 
he  said  he  believed  a  devil  possessed  him  that 
night ;  for  he  had  no  reason  to  wish  evil  either 
to  Whittier  or  Thompson,  yet  he  was  filled  with 
a  desire  to  kill  them,  and  he  thought  he  should 
have  done  so  if  they  had  not  escaped.  He 
added  that  the  mob  was  like  a  crowd  of  de 
mons,  and  he  knew  one  man  who  had  mixed  a 
black  dye  to  dip  them  in,  which  would  be  almost 
impossible  to  get  off.  He  could  not  explain  to 
himself  or  to  another  the  state  of  mind  he  was  in. 

The  next  morning  we  walked  with  Whittier 
again  in  his  little  garden,  and  saw  his  grapes, 
which  were  a  source  of  pride  and  pleasure.  One 


WHITTIER  297 

vine,  he  told  us,  came  up  from  a  tiny  rootlet 
sent  to  him  by  Charles  Sumner,  in  a  letter  from 
Washington. 

Later  we  strolled  forth  into  the  village  street 
as  far  as  the  Friends'  meeting-house,  and  sat 
down  upon  the  steps  while  he  told  us  some 
thing  of  his  neighbors.  He  himself,  he  said, 
had  planted  the  trees  about  the  church  :  they 
were  then  good-sized  trees.  He  spoke  very 
earnestly  about  the  worship  of  the  Friends. 
All  the  associations  of  his  youth  and  all  the 
canons  of  his  education  and  development  were 
grounded  on  the  Friends'  faith  and  doctrine, 
and  he  was  anxious  that  they  should  show  a 
growth  commensurate  with  the  age.  He  dis 
liked  many  of  the  innovations,  but  his  affection 
ate  spirit  clung  to  his  people,  and  he  longed  to 
see  them  drawing  to  themselves  a  larger  meas 
ure  of  spiritual  life,  day  by  day.  He  loved  the 
old  custom  of  sitting  in  silence,  and  hoped  they 
would  not  stray  away  into  habits  of  much  speak 
ing.  The  old  habits  of  the  meeting-house  were 
very  dear  to  him. 

One  cold,  clear  morning  in  January  I  heard 
his  early  ring  at  the  door.  He  had  been  ill,  but 
was  so  much  better  that  he  was  absolutely  gay. 
He  insisted  upon  blowing  the  fire,  which,  as 
sometimes  happens,  will  struggle  to  do  its  worst 
on  the  coldest  days ;  and  as  the  flames  at  last 
began  to  roar,  his  spirits  rose  with  them.  He 


298  WH1TTIER 

was  rejoicing  over  Garibaldi's  victory.  The 
sufferings  of  Italy  had  been  so  terrible  that 
even  one  small  victory  in  their  behalf  seemed  a 
great  gain.  He  said  that  he  had  been  trying 
to  arouse  the  interest  of  the  Friends,  but  it 
usually  took  about  two  years  to  awaken  them 
thoroughly  on  any  great  topic  ! 

He  remained  several  hours  that  morning 
talking  over  his  hopes  for  the  country,  —  of 
politics,  of  Charles  Sumner,  of  whom  he  said, 
"  Sumner  is  always  fundamentally  right ; "  and 
of  John  Bright,  for  whose  great  gifts  he  had 
sincere  admiration.  Soon  afterwards,  at  the 
time  of  this  great  man's  death,  Whittier  wrote 
to  us  :  "  Spring  is  here  to-day,  warm,  birdfull. 
...  It  seems  strange  that  I  am  alive  to  wel 
come  her  when  so  many  have  passed  away  with 
the  winter,  and  among  them  that  stalwartest  of 
Englishmen,  John  Bright,  sleeping  now  in  the 
daisied  grounds  of  Rochdale,  never  more  to 
move  the  world  with  his  surpassing  eloquence. 
How  I  regret  that  I  have  never  seen  him  !  We 
had  much  in  common  in  our  religious  faith, 
our  hatred  of  war  and  oppression.  His  great 
genius  seemed  to  me  to  be  always  held  firmly 
in  hand  by  a  sense  of  duty,  and  by  the  practical 
common  sense  of  a  shrewd  man  of  business. 
He  fought  through  life  like  an  old  knight- 
errant,  but  without  enthusiasm.  He  had  no 
personal  ideals.  I  remember  once  how  he  re 
monstrated  with  me  for  my  admiration  for  Gen- 


WHITTIER  299 

eral  Gordon.  He  looked  upon  that  wonderful 
personality  as  a  wild  fighter,  a  rash  adventurer, 
doing  evil  that  good  might  come.  He  could 
not  see  him  as  I  saw  him,  giving  his  life  for 
humanity,  alone  and  unfriended,  in  that  dread 
ful  Soudan.  He  did  not  like  the  idea  of  fighting 
Satan  with  Satan's  weapons.  Lord  Salisbury 
said  truly  that  John  Bright  was  the  greatest  ora 
tor  England  had  produced,  and  his  eloquence 
was  only  called  out  by  what  he  regarded  as  the 
voice  of  God  in  his  soul." 

When  at  length  Whittier  rose  to  go  that  win 
ter  morning,  with  the  feeling  that  he  had  already 
taken  too  large  a  piece  out  of  the  day,  we 
pressed  him  to  stay  longer,  since  it  was  already 
late.  "  Why  can't  you  stay  ? "  urged  his  host. 
"  Because,  I  tell  you,  I  don't  want  to,"  which 
set  us  all  laughing,  and  settled  the  question. 

Our  first  knowledge  of  his  arrival  in  town  was 
usually  that  early  and  punctual  ring  at  the  door 
to  which  I  have  referred.  He  would  come  in 
looking  pale  and  thin,  but  full  of  fire,  and,  as 
we  would  soon  find,  of  a  certain  vigor.  He  be 
came  interested  one  morning  in  a  plan  proposed 
to  him  for  making  a  collection  of  poems  for 
young  people,  one  which  he  finally  completed 
with  the  aid  of  Miss  Lucy  Larcom.  We  got 
down  from  the  shelf  Longfellow's  "  Poets  and 
Poetry  of  Europe,"  and  looked  it  over  together. 
"Annie  of  Tharaw  "  was  a  great  favorite  of  his, 
and  the  poem  by  Dirk  Smit,  on  "  The  Death 


300  WHITTIER 

of  an  Infant,"  found  his  ready  appreciation. 
Whittier  easily  fell  from  these  into  talk  of 
Burns,  who  was  his  master  and  ideal.  "He 
lives,  next  to  Shakespeare,"  he  said,  "in  the 
heart  of  humanity." 

In  speaking  of  Rossetti  and  of  his  ballad  of 
"  Sister  Helen,"  he  confessed  to  being  strangely 
attracted  to  this  poem  because  he  could  re 
member  seeing  his  mother,  "who  was  as  good 
a  woman  as  ever  lived,"  and  his  aunt  perform 
ing  the  same  strange  act  of  melting  a- waxen 
figure  of  a  clergyman  of  their  time.1 

There  was  some  talk,  also,  that  morning  of 
the  advantages,  in  these  restless  days,  accru 
ing  to  those  who  "  stay  put  "  in  this  world,  in 
stead  of  to  those  who  are  forever  beating  about, 
searching  for  greater  opportunities  from  posi 
tion  or  circumstance.  He  laughed  heartily  over 
the  tale,  which  had  just  then  reached  us,  of 
Carlyle  going  to  hunt  up  a  new  residence  in 
London  with  a  map  of  the  world  in  his  pocket. 

We  asked  Whittier  if  he  never  felt  tempted 
to  go  to  Quebec  from  his  well-beloved  haunts 
in  the  White  Mountains.  "Oh  no,"  he  replied. 
"  I  know  it  all  by  books  and  pictures  just  as 
well  as  if  I  had  seen  it." 

1  Mr.  Pickard,  the  biographer  of  the  poet,  believes  that 
there  is  some  mistake  about  this,  and  suggests  "  that  the  story 
of  the  waxen  image  was  one  told  by  Whittier's  mother  of  a 
happening  in  another  family,  possibly  of  something  she  her 
self  had  witnessed." 


WHITTIER  301 

This  talk  of  traveling  reminded  him  of  a  cir 
cus  which  came  one  season  to  Amesbury.  "  I 
was  in  my  garden,"  he  said,  "  when  I  saw  an 
Arab  wander  down  the  street,  and  by  and  by 
stop  and  lean  against  my  gate.  He  held  a  small 
book  in  his  hand,  which  he  was  reading  from 
time  to  time  when  he  was  not  occupied  with 
gazing  about  him.  Presently  I  went  to  talk 
with  him,  and  found  he  had  lived  all  his  life  on 
the  edge  of  the  Desert  until  he  had  started  for 
America.  He  was  very  homesick,  and  longed 
for  the  time  of  his  return.  He  had  hired  him 
self  for  a  term  of  years  to  the  master  of  the 
circus.  He  held  the  Koran  in  his  hand,  and 
was  delighted  to  find  a  friend  who  had  also  read 
his  sacred  book.  He  opened  his  heart  still  fur 
ther  then,  and  said  how  he  longed  for  his  old, 
wild  life  in  the  Desert,  for  a  sight  of  the  palms 
and  the  sands,  but,  above  all,  for  its  freedom." 
This  interview  made  a  deep  impression,  natu 
rally,  upon  Whittier's  mind,  he,  who  was  no 
traveler  himself,  having  thus  sung  :  — 

"  He  who  wanders  widest,  lifts 
No  more  of  beauty's  jealous  veil 
Than  he  who  from  his  doorway  sees 
The  miracle  of  flowers  and  trees." 

The  memory  of  a  visit  to  Amesbury,  made 
once  in  September,  vividly  remains  with  me. 
It  was  early  in  the  month,  when  the  lingering 
heat  of  summer  seems  sometimes  to  gather 
fresh  intensity  from  the  fact  that  we  are  so  soon 


302  WHITTIER 

to  hear  the  winds  of  autumn.  Amesbury  had 
greatly  altered  of  late  years  ;  large  enough  to 
be  a  city,"  our  friend  declared  ;  "but  I  am  not 
fat  enough  to  be  an  alderman."  To  us  it  was 
still  a  small  village,  though  somewhat  dustier 
and  less  attractive  than  when  we  first  knew  it. 
As  we  approached  the  house,  we  saw  him 
from  a  distance  characteristically  gazing  down 
the  road  for  us,  from  his  front  yard,  and 
then  at  the  first  glimpse  suddenly  disappear 
ing,  to  come  forth  again  to  meet  us,  quite 
fresh  and  quiet,  from  his  front  door.  It 
had  been  a  very  hot,  dry  summer,  and  every 
thing  about  that  place,  as  about  every  other, 
was  parched  and  covered  with  dust.  There 
had  been  no  rain  for  weeks,  and  the  village 
street  was  then  quite  innocent  of  watering 
carts.  The  fruit  hung  heavily  from  the  nearly 
leafless  trees,  and  the  soft  thud  of  the  pears  and 
apples  as  they  fell  to  the  ground  could  be  heard 
on  every  side  in  the  quiet  house-yards.  The 
sun  struggled  feebly  through  the  mists  during 
the  noontide  hours,  when  a  still  heat  pervaded 
rather  than  struck  the  earth ;  and  then  in  the 
early  afternoon,  and  late  into  the  next  morning, 
a  stirless  cloud  seemed  to  cover  the  face  of  the 
world.  These  mists  were  much  increased  by 
the  burning  of  peat  and  brush,  and,  alas  !  of  the 
very  woods  themselves  in  every  direction.  Al 
together,  as  Whittier  said,  quaintly,  "it  was 
very  encouraging  weather  for  the  Millerites." 


WHITTIER  303 

His  niece,  who  bears  the  name  of  his  beloved 
sister,  was  then  the  mistress  of  his  house,  and 
we  were  soon  made  heartily  welcome.  Every 
thing  was  plain  and  neat  as  became  a  Friend's 
household ;  but  as  the  village  had  grown  to  be 
a  stirring  place,  and  the  house  stood  close  upon 
the  dusty  road,  such  charming  neatness  must 
sometimes  have  been  a  difficult  achievement. 
The  noonday  meal  was  soon  served  and  soon 
ended,  and  then  we  sat  down  behind  the  half- 
closed  blinds,  looking  out  upon  the  garden,  the 
faded  vines,  and  almost  leafless  trees.  It  was 
a  cosy  room,  with  its  Franklin  stove,  at  this 
season  surmounted  by  a  bouquet,  and  a  table 
between  the  windows,  where  was  a  larger  bou 
quet,  which  Whittier  himself  had  gathered  that 
morning  in  anticipation  of  our  arrival.  He 
seemed  brighter  and  better  than  we  had  dared 
to  hope,  and  was  in  excellent  mood  for  talking. 
Referring  again  to  the  Millerites,  who  had  been 
so  reanimated  by  the  forest  fires,  he  said  he 
had  been  deeply  impressed  lately  with  their  de 
plorable  doctrines.  "  Continually  disappointed 
because  we  don't  all  burn  up  on  a  sudden,  they 
forget  to  be  thankful  for  their  preservation  from 
the  dire  fate  they  predict  with  so  much  compla 
cency." 

He  had  just  received  a  proof  of  his  poem 
"  Miriam,"  with  the  introduction,  and  he  could 
not  be  content  until  they  had  both  been  read 
aloud  to  him.  After  the  reading  they  were 


304  WHITTIER 

duly  commented  upon,  and  revised  until  he 
thought  he  could  do  no  more  ;  yet  twice  before 
our  departure  the  proofs  were  taken  out  of  the 
hand-bag  where  they  were  safely  stowed  away, 
and  again  more  or  less  altered. 

Whittier's  ever-growing  fame  was  not  taken 
by  him  as  a  matter  of  course.  "  I  cannot  think 
very  well  of  my  own  things,"  he  used  to  say  ; 
"  and  what  is  mere  fame  worth  when  thee  is 
at  home,  alone,  and  sick  with  headaches,  una 
ble  either  to  read  or  to  write  ? "  Nevertheless, 
he  derived  very  great  pleasure  and  consolation 
from  the  letters  and  tributes  which  poured  in 
upon  him  from  hearts  he  had  touched  or  lives 
he  had  quickened.  "That  I  like,"  he  would 
say  sometimes  ;  "  that  is  worth  having."  But  he 
must  often  have  known  the  deeps  of  sadness  in 
winter  evenings  when  he  was  too  ill  to  touch 
book  or  pen,  and  when  he  could  do  nothing 
during  the  long  hours  but  sit  and  think  over 
the  fire. 

We  slept  in  Elizabeth's  chamber.  The  por 
trait  of  their  mother,  framed  in  autumn  leaves 
gathered  in  the  last  autumn  of  her  life,  hung 
upon  the  wall.  Here,  too,  as  in  our  bedroom  at 
Dickens's,  the  Diary  of  Pepys  lay  on  the  table. 
Dickens  had  read  his  copy  faithfully,  and  writ 
ten  notes  therein.  Of  this  copy  the  leaves  had 
not  been  cut ;  but  with  it  lay  the  "  Prayers  of 
the  Ages,"  and  volumes  of  poems,  which  had  all 
been  well  read,  and  "  Pickwick  "  upon  the  top. 


WHITTIER  305 

In  the  year  1867  Charles  Dickens  came  to 
America  to  give  his  famous  Readings.  Whit- 
tier,  as  we  have  seen,  was  seldom  tempted  out 
of  his  country  home  and  habitual  ways,  but 
Dickens  was  for  one  moment  too  much  for  him. 
To  our  surprise,  he  wrote  to  ask  if  he  could 
possibly  get  a  seat  to  hear  him.  "  I  see  there 
is  a  crazy  rush  for  tickets."  A  favorable  an 
swer  was  dispatched  to  him  as  soon  as  practi 
cable,  but  he  had  already  repented  of  the  indis 
cretion.  "My  dear  Fields,"  he  wrote,  "up  to 
the  last  moment  I  have  hoped  to  occupy  the 
seat  so  kindly  promised  me  for  this  evening. 
But  I  find  I  must  give  it  up.  Gladden  with  it 
the  heart  of  some  poor  wretch  who  dangled  and 
shivered  all  in  vain  in  your  long  queue  the  other 
morning.  I  must  read  my  *  Pickwick '  alone,  as 
the  Marchioness  played  cribbage.  I  should  so 
like,  nevertheless,  to  see  Dickens  and  shake 
that  creative  hand  of  his  !  It  is  as  well,  doubt 
less,  so  far  as  he  is  concerned,  that  I  cannot  do 
it ;  he  will  have  enough  and  too  much  of  that, 
I  fear.  I  dreamed  last  night  I  saw  him  sur 
rounded  by  a  mob  of  ladies,  each  with  her 
scissors  snipping  at  his  hair,  and  he  seemed  in 
a  fair  way  to  be  '  shaven  and  shorn,'  like  the 
Priest  in  '  The  House  that  Jack  Built.'  " 

The  large  events  of  humanity  were  to  Whit- 
tier  a  portion  of  his  own  experience,  his  per 
sonal  life  being,  in  the  ordinary  sense,  devoid 
of  incident.  The  death  of  Charles  Dickens,  in 


306  WHITTIER 

1871,  was  a  personal  loss,  just  as  his  life  had 
been  a  living  gain  to  this  remote  and  invalid 
man.  One  long  quiet  summer  afternoon  shortly 
after,  Whittier  joined  us  for  the  sake  of  talking 
about  Dickens.  He  told  us  what  sunshine  came 
from  him  into  his  own  solemn  and  silent  country 
life,  and  what  grateful  love  he  must  ever  bear 
to  him.  He  wished  to  hear  all  that  could  be 
told  of  him  as  a  man.  Tea  came,  and  the  sun 
went  down,  and  still  he  talked  and  questioned, 
and  then,  after  a  long  silence,  he  said  suddenly  : 
"What 's  he  doing  now?  Sometimes  I  say,  in 
Shakespeare's  phrase,  O  for  some  *  courteous 
ghost/  but  nothing  ever  comes  to  me.  He  was 
so  human  I  should  think  thee  must  see  him 
sometimes.  It  seems  as  if  he  were  the  very 
person  to  manifest  himself  and  give  us  a  glimpse 
beyond.  I  believe  I  have  faith  ;  I  sometimes 
think  I  have;  but  this  desire  to  see  just  a  little 
way  is  terribly  strong  in  me.  I  have  expressed 
something  of  it  in  my  verses  to  Mrs.  Child  about 
Loring." 

He  spoke  also  of  the  significance  of  our 
prayers  ;  of  their  deep  value  to  our  spirit  in  con 
stantly  renewing  the  sense  of  dependence  ;  and 
further,  since  we  "  surely  find  that  our  prayers 
are  answered,  what  blindness  and  fatuity  there 
is  in  neglect  or  abuse  of  our  privilege  !  " 

He  was  thinking  of  editing  a  new  edition  of 
John  Woolman.  He  hoped  to  induce  certain 
people  who  would  read  his  own  books  to  read 
that,  by  writing  a  preface  for  it. 


WHITTIER  307 

The  death  of  Henry  Ward  Beecher  was  also 
a  loss  and  a  sadness  to  him  in  his  solitary 
life.  "  I  am  saddened  by  the  death  of  Beecher," 
he  wrote ;  "  he  was  so  strong,  so  generous,  so 
warm  hearted,  and  so  brave  and  stalwart  in  so 
many  good  causes.  It  is  a  mighty  loss.  He 
had  faults,  like  all  of  us,  and  needed  forgive 
ness  ;  but  I  think  he  could  say,  with  David  of 
old,  that  he  would  rather  fall  into  the  Lord's 
hands  than  into  the  hands  of  man." 

It  is  anticipating  the  years  and  interrupting 
the  narrative  to  mention  here  a  few  of  the  men 
who  gladdened  his  later  life  by  their  friendship, 
but  the  subject  demands  a  brief  space  before 
we  return  to  the  current  story  of  his  days. 

Matthew  Arnold  went  to  see  him  upon  his 
arrival  in  this  country,  and  it  is  needless  to  say 
that  Whittier  derived  sincere  pleasure  from  the 
visit ;  but  Arnold's  delightful  recognition  of 
Whittier's  "In  School  Days,"  as  one  of  the 
perfect  poems  which  must  live,  gave  him  fresh 
assurance  of  fulfilled  purpose  in  existence.  He 
had  followed  Arnold  with  appreciation  from  his 
earliest  appearance  in  the  world  of  letters,  and 
knew  him,  as  it  were,  "by  heart"  long  before 
a  personal  interview  was  possible.  In  a  letter 
'written  after  Arnold's  return  to  England,  he 
says  :  "  I  share  thy  indignation  at  the  way  our 
people  have  spoken  of  him  —  one  of  the  fore 
most  men  of  our  time;  a  true  poet,  a  wise  critic, 
and  a  brave,  upright  man,  to  whom  all  the 


3o8  WHITTIER 

English-speaking  people  owe  a  debt  of  grati 
tude.  I  am  sorry  I  could  not  see  him  again." 

When  the  end  came,  a  few  years  later,  he 
was  among  the  first  to  say,  "What  a  loss 
English  literature  has  sustained  in  the  death  of 
Matthew  Arnold  !  " 

As  I  have  already  suggested,  he  kept  the  run 
of  all  the  noteworthy  persons  who  came  to  Boston 
quite  as  surely  as  they  kept  in  pursuit  of  him. 

"  I  hope  thee  will  see  the  wonderful  prophet 
of  the  Bramo  Somaj,  Mozoomdar,  before  he 
leaves  the  country.  I  should  have  seen  him  in 
Boston  but  for  illness  last  week.  That  move 
ment  in  India  is  the  greatest  event  in  the  his 
tory  of  Christianity  since  the  days  of  Paul. 

"  So  the  author  of  '  Christie  Johnstone '  is 
dead.  I  have  read  and  re-read  that  charming 
little  story  with  ever-increasing  admiration.  I 
am  sorry  for  the  coarseness  of  some  of  his  later 
writings ;  but  he  was,  after  all,  a  great  novel 
ist,  second  only  in  our  times  to  George  Eliot, 
Dickens,  and  Thackeray.  ...  I  shall  be  glad 

to  hear  more  about  Mr.  Wood's  and  Mrs. 's 

talks.  Any  hint  or  sign  or  token  from  the  un 
seen  and  spiritual  world  is  full  of  solemn  inter 
est,  standing  as  I  do  on  the  shore  of  '  that  vast 
ocean  I  must  sail  so  soon.'  .  .  . 

"  You  will  soon  have  Amelia  Edwards  again 
with  you.  I  am  sorry  that  I  have  not  been  able 
to  call  on  her.  Pray  assure  her  of  my  sincere 
respect  and  admiration." 


WHITTIER  309 

And  again  :  "  Have  thee  seen  and  heard  the 
Hindoo  Mohini  ?  He  seems  to  have  really  con 
verted  some  people.  I  hear  that  one  of  them 
has  got  a  Bible  !  " 

The  phrase  that  he  is  "beset  by  pilgrims  " 
occurs  frequently  in  his  letters,  contrasted  with 
pleased  expressions,  and  descriptions  of  visits 
from  Phillips  Brooks,  Canon  Farrar,  Governor 
and  Mrs.  Claflin,  and  other  friends  whose  faces 
were  always  a  joy  to  him. 

I  have  turned  aside  from  the  narrative  of 
every-day  life  to  mention  these  friends ;  but 
it  is  interesting  to  return  and  recall  the  ear 
lier  years,  when  he  came  one  day  to  dine  in 
Charles  Street  with  Mr.  Emerson.  As  usual, 
his  coming  had  been  very  uncertain.  He  was 
never  to  be  counted  upon  as  a  visitor,  but  at 
length  the  moment  came  when  he  was  in  better 
health  than  ordinary,  and  the  stars  were  in  con 
junction.  I  can  recall  his  saying  to  Emerson  : 
"  I  had  to  choose  between  hearing  thee  at  thy 
lecture  and  coming  here  to  see  thee.  I  chose 
to  see  thee.  I  could  not  do  both."  Emerson 
was  heard  to  say  to  him  solicitously :  "  I  hope 
you  are  pretty  well,  sir !  I  believe  you  for 
merly  bragged  of  bad  health." 

It  was  Whittier's  custom,  however,  to  make 
quite  sure  that  all  "lions"  and  other  disturbing 
elements  were  well  out  of  the  way  before  he 
turned  his  steps  to  the  library  in  Charles  Street. 
I  recall  his  coming  one  Sunday  morning  when 


3io  WHITTIER 

we  were  at  church,  and  waiting  until  our  return. 
He  thought  that  would  be  a  safe  moment !  He 
was  full,  as  Madame  de  Sevigne"  says,  "  de  con 
versations  infinies"  being  especially  interested 
just  then  in  the  question  of  schools  for  the 
f  reedmen,  and  eagerly  discussed  ways  and  means 
for  starting  and  supporting  them. 

We  were  much  amused  by  his  ingenuity  in 
getting  contributions  from  his  own  town.  It 
appears  he  had  taken  into  consideration  the 
many  carriage-makers  in  Amesbury. .  He  sug 
gested  that  each  one  of  these  men  should  give 
some  part  of  a  carriage  —  one  the  wheels,  one 
the  body,  one  the  furnishings,  thus  dividing  it 
in  all  among  twenty  workmen.  When  it  was 
put  together,  there  stood  a  carriage  which  was 
sold  for  two  hundred  dollars,  exactly  the  sum 
requisite  for  Amesbury  to  give. 

He  had  just  parted  from  his  niece,  who  had 
gone  to  teach  the  freed  people  in  a  small  South 
ern  village.  He  could  not  help  feeling  anxious 
for  her  welfare.  She  and  her  young  co-workers 
would  be  the  only  Northerners  in  the  place.  Of 
course,  such  new  comers  would  be  regarded  with 
no  friendly  eye  by  the  "  mean  whites,"  and  their 
long  distance  from  home  and  from  any  pro 
tection  would  make  their  position  a  very  forlorn 
one  indeed  if  the  natives  should  turn  against 
them.  He  was  fearful  lest  they  should  be  half 
starved.  However,  they  had  departed  in  ex 
cellent  spirits,  which  went  a  long  way  to  cheer 
everybody  concerned. 


WHITTIER  311 

He  was  also  full  of  sympathy  and  anxiety 
regarding  the  well  being  of  a  young  colored 
girl  here  at  the  North,  whose  sad  situation  he 
had  been  called  upon  to  relieve ;  and  after  dis 
cussing  ways  and  laying  plans  for  her  comfort 
(which  he  afterwards  adhered  to,  until  in  later 
years  she  was  placed  in  a  happy  home  of  her 
own),  he  went  on  to  discuss  the  needs  of  yet  a 
third  young  person,  another  victim  of  the  war, 
who  was  then  teaching  in  Amesbury.  He  was 
almost  as  remarkable  as  Mrs.  Child  in  his  power 
of  making  his  own  small  provision  into  a  broad 
mantle  to  cover  many  shoulders.  He  was  un 
daunted,  too,  in  his  efforts,  where  his  own  re 
sources  failed,  to  get  what  was  needed  by  the 
help  of  others.  His  common  sense  was  so 
great  and  his  own  habits  so  frugal,  that  no 
one  could  imagine  a  dollar  wasted  or  misap 
plied  that  was  confided  to  his  stewardship.  His 
benefactions  were  ceaseless,  and  they  were  one 
of  the  chief  joys  of  his  later  life.  The  subject 
of  what  may  be  done  for  this  or  that  person 
or  cause  is  continually  recurring  in  his  letters. 
Once  I  find  this  plea  in  verse  after  the  manner 
of  Burns :  — 

"  O  well-paid  author,  fat-fed  scholar, 
Whose  pockets  jingle  with  the  dollar, 
No  sheriff's  hand  upon  your  collar, 

No  duns  to  bother, 
Think  on  't,  a  tithe  of  what  ye  swallow 

Would  save  your  brother  !  " 

And  again  and  again  there  are  passages  in  his 


312  WHITTIER 

letters  like  the  following  :  "  I  hope  the  Indus 
trial  Home  may  be  saved,  and  wish  I  was  a  rich 
man  just  long  enough  to  help  save  it.  As  it 
is,  if  the  subscription  needs  $30  to  fill  it  up,  I 
shall  be  glad  to  give  the  mite."  "I  have  long 
followed  Maurice,"  he  says  again,  "in  his  work 
as  a  religious  and  social  reformer  —  a  true  apos 
tle  of  the  gospel  of  humanity.  He  saw  clearly, 
and  in  advance  of  his  clerical  brethren,  the  ne 
cessity  of  wise  and  righteous  dealing  with  the 
momentous  and  appalling  questions  Of  labor 
and  poverty.'' 

He  wrote  one  day  :  "  If  you  go  to  Richmond, 
why  don't  you  visit  Hampton  and  Old  Point 
Comfort,  where  that  Christian  knight  and  lat 
ter-day  Galahad,  General  Armstrong,  is  making 
his  holy  experiment  ?  I  think  it  would  be  worth 
your  while." 

General  Armstrong  and  his  brave  work  in 
founding  and  maintaining  the  Hampton  School 
for  the  education,  at  first,  of  the  colored  people 
alone,  and  finally  for  the  Indians  also,  was  one 
of  the  near  and  living  interests  of  Whittier's 
life.  Often  and  often  in  his  letters  do  we  find 
references  to  the  subject ;  either  he  regrets 
having  to  miss  seeing  the  general,  upon  one 
of  his  Northern  trips,  or  he  rejoices  in  falling 
in  with  some  of  the  teachers  at  Asquam  Lake 
or  elsewhere,  or  his  note  is  jubilant  over  some 
new  gift  which  will  make  the  general's  work 
for  the  year  less  difficult. 


WHITTIER  313 

Once  he  writes :  "  I  am  grieved  to  hear  of 
General  Armstrong's  illness.  I  am  not  sur 
prised  at  it.  He  has  been  working  in  his 
noble  cause  beyond  any  mortal  man's  strength. 
He  must  have  a  rest  if  it  is  possible  for  him, 
and  his  friends  must  now  keep  up  the  school 
by  redoubled  efforts.  Ah  me!  There  is  so 
much  to  be  done  in  this  world  !  I  wish  I  were 
younger,  or  a  millionaire." 

And  yet  again  :  "  I  had  the  pleasure  of  send 
ing  General  Armstrong  at  Christmas,  with  my 
annual  subscription,  one  thousand  dollars  which 
a  friend  placed  in  my  hand.  I  wish  our  friend 
could  be  relieved  from  the  task  of  raising  money 
by  a  hundred  such  donations." 

The  choice  of  the  early  breakfast  hour  for 
his  visits  was  his  own  idea.  He  was  glad  to 
hit  upon  a  moment  which  was  not  subject  to 
interruptions,  one  when  he  could  talk  at  his 
ease  of  books  and  men.  These  visits  were 
always  a  surprise.  He  liked  to  be  abroad  in 
good  season,  and  had  rarely  missed  seeing  the 
sun  rise  in  forty  years.  He  knew,  too,  that  we 
were  not  late  people,  and  that  his  visits  could 
never  be  untimely.  Occasionally,  with  the  vari 
ous  evening  engagements  of  a  city,  we  were 
not  altogether  fit  to  receive  him,  but  it  was  a 
pleasure  to  hear  his  footstep  in  the  morning, 
and  to  know  that  we  should  find  him  in  the 
library  by  the  fire.  He  was  himself  a  bad 
sleeper,  seldom,  as  he  said,  putting  a  solid  bar 


314  WHITTIER 

of  sleep  between  day  and  day,  and  therefore 
often  early  abroad  to  question  the  secrets  of 
the  dawn.  We  owe  much  of  the  intimate 
friendship  of  our  life  to  these  morning  hours 
spent  in  private,  uninterrupted  talk. 

"  I    have   lately   felt    great    sympathy  with 

,"  he  said  one  morning,  "for  I  have  been 

kept  awake  one  hundred  and  twenty  hours  — 
an  experience  I  should  not  care  to  try  again." 

One  of  Whittier's  summer  pleasures,- in  which 
he  occasionally  indulged  himself,  was  a  visit  to 
the  Isles  of  Shoals.  He  loved  to  see  his  friend 
Celia  Thaxter  in  her  island  home,  and  he  loved 
the  freedom  of  a  large  hotel.  He  liked  to 
make  arrangements  with  a  group  of  his  more 
particular  friends  to  meet  him  there;  and 
when  he  was  well  enough  to  leave  his  room,  he 
might  be  seen  in  some  carefully  chosen  corner 
of  the  great  piazzas,  shady  or  sunny,  as  the 
day  invited  him,  enjoying  the  keenest  happi 
ness  in  the  voluntary  society  and  conversation 
of  those  dear  to  him.  Occasionally  he  would 
pass  whole  days  in  Celia  Thaxter's  parlor,  watch 
ing  her  at  her  painting  in  the  window,  and  lis 
tening  to  the  talk  around  him.  He  wished  to 
hear  and  know  what  interested  others.  He 
liked  nothing  better,  he  once  said,  than  going 
into  the  "store  "  in  the  old  days  at  Amesbury, 
when  it  was  a  common  centre,  almost  serving 
the  purpose  of  what  a  club  may  be  in  these 


WHITTIER  315 

later  days,  and  sitting  upon  a  barrel  to  hear 
"folks  talk."  The  men  there  did  not  know 
much  about  his  poetry,  but  they  understood  his 
politics,  and  he  was  able  to  put  in  many  a  word 
to  turn  the  vote  of  the  town.  In  Celia  Thax- 
ter's  parlor  he  found  a  different  company,  but 
his  relations  to  the  people  who  frequented  that 
delightful  place  were  practically  the  same.  He 
wished  to  understand  their  point  of  view,  if  pos 
sible,  and  then,  if  he  could  find  opportunity,  he 
would  help  them  to  a  higher  standpoint. 

I  remember  one  season  in  particular,  when 
the  idle  talk  of  idle  persons  had  been  drifting  in 
and  out  during  the  day,  while  he  sat  patiently 
on  in  the  corner  of  the  pretty  room.  Mrs. 
Thaxter  was  steadily  at  work  at  her  table,  yet 
always  hospitable,  losing  sight  of  no  cloud  or 
shadow  or  sudden  gleam  of  glory  in  the  land 
scape,  and  pointing  the  talk  often  with  keen 
wit.  Nevertheless,  the  idleness  of  it  all  palled 
upon  him.  It  was  Sunday,  too,  and  he  longed 
for  something  which  would  move  us  to  "  higher 
levels."  Suddenly,  as  if  the  idea  struck  him 
like  an  inspiration,  he  rose,  and  taking  a  volume 
of  Emerson  from  the  little  library  he  opened 
to  one  of  the  discourses,  and  handing  it  to  Celia 
Thaxter  said :  — 

"Read  that  aloud,  will  thee  ?  I  think  we 
should  all  like  to  hear  it." 

She  read  it  through  at  his  bidding ;  then  he 
took  up  the  thread  of  the  discourse,  and  talked 


3i6  WHITTIER 

long  and  earnestly  upon  the  beauty  and  neces 
sity  of  worship  —  a  necessity  consequent  upon 
the  nature  of  man,  upon  his  own  weakness,  and 
his  consciousness  of  the  Divine  Spirit  within 
him.  His  whole  heart  was  stirred,  and  he  poured 
himself  out  towards  us  as  if  he  longed,  like  the 
prophet  of  old,  to  breathe  a  new  life  into  us.  I 
could  see  that  he  reproached  himself  for  not 
having  spoken  out  in  this  way  before,  but  his 
enfranchised  spirit  took  only  a  stronger  flight 
for  the  delay. 

I  have  never  heard  of  Whittier's  speaking  in 
the  meeting-house,  although  he  was  doubtless 
often  "moved"  to  do  so ;  but  to  us  who  heard 
him  on  that  day  he  became  more  than  ever  a 
light  unto  our  feet.  It  was  not  an  easy  thing  to 
do  to  stem  the  accustomed  current  of  life  in  this 
way,  and  it  is  a  deed  only  possible  to  those  who, 
in  the  Bible  phrase,  "walk  with  God." 

Such  an  unusual  effort  was  not  without  its 
consequences.  It  was  followed  by  a  severe 
headache,  and  he  was  hardly  seen  abroad  again 
during  his  stay. 

We  heard  from  him  again,  shortly  after,  under 
the  shadow  of  the  great  hills  where  he  always 
passed  a  part  of  every  year.  He  loved  them, 
and  wrote  eloquently  of  the  loveliness  of  nature 
at  Ossipee  :  "the  Bearcamp  winding  down,"  the 
long  green  valley  close  by  the  door,  the  long 
Sandwich  and  Waterville  ranges,  and  Chocorua 
filling  up  the  horizon  from  west  to  northeast. 


WHITTIER  317 

The  frequent  loneliness  of  his  life  often  found 
expression.  Once  he  says  :  — 

"  I  wish  I  could  feel  that  I  deserved  a  tithe 
even  of  the  kind  things  said  of  me  by  my  per 
sonal  friends.  If  one  could  but  be  as  easily  as 
preach  !  The  confession  of  poor  Burns  might,  I 
fear,  be  made  of  the  best  of  us  :  — 

" '  God  knows  I  'm  no  the  thing  I  would  be, 
Nor  am  I  even  the  thing  I  could  be.' 

And  yet  I  am  thankful  every  day  of  my  life 
that  God  has  put  it  into  the  hearts  of  so  many 
whom  I  love  and  honor  and  reverence  to  send 
me  so  many  messages  of  good  will  and  kindness. 
It  is  an  unspeakable  comfort  in  the  lonely  and 
darkening  afternoon  of  life.  Indeed,  I  can  never 
feel  quite  alone  so  long  as  I  know  that  all  about 
me  are  those  who  turn  to  me  with  friendly  in 
terest,  and,  strange  to  say,  with  gratitude.  A 
sense  of  lack  of  desert  on  my  part  is  a  draw 
back,  of  course  ;  but  then,  I  say  to  myself,  if  my 
friends  judge  me  by  my  aim  and  desire,  and  not 
by  my  poor  performance,  it  may  be  all  right 
and  just." 

The  painful  solitude  of  his  life  after  his  dear 
niece's  marriage  was  softened  when  he  went  to 
live  with  his  cousins  at  Oak  Knoll,  in  Danvers, 
a  pleasant  country  seat,  sheltered  and  suited  to 
his  needs. 

Of  this  place  Mrs.  Spoff ord  says,  in  a  delight 
ful  biographical  paper  :  "  The  estate  of  Oak 


3i8  WHITTIER 

Knoll  is  one  of  some  historical  associations,  as 
here  once  lived  the  Rev.  George  Burroughs,  the 
only  clergyman  in  the  annals  of  Salem  witch 
craft  who  was  hung  for  dark  dealings,  Dan- 
vers  having  originally  been  a  part  of  the  town 
of  Salem,  where  witchcraft  came  to  a  blaze, 
and  was  stamped  out  of  existence.  .  .  .  The 
only  relic  on  the  place  of  its  tragedy  is  the  well 
of  the  Burroughs'  house,  which  is  still  in  the 
hay-field,  and  over  which  is  the  resting-place  of 
the  sounding-board  of  the  pulpit  in  the -church 
where  the  witches  were  tried." 

At  Danvers  he  was  able  to  enjoy  the  free 
open  air.  He  loved  to  sit  under  the  fine  trees 
which  distinguished  the  lawn,  to  play  with  the 
dogs,  and  wander  about  unmolested  until  he  was 
tired.  The  ladies  of  the  house  exerted  them 
selves  to  give  him  perfect  freedom  and  the 
tenderest  care.  The  daughter  became  his  play 
mate,  and  she  never  quite  grew  up,  in  his  esti 
mation.  She  was  his  lively  and  loving  com 
panion.  Writing  from  Danvers,  one  December, 
he  says,  "What  with  the  child,  and  the  dogs, 
and  Rip  Van  Winkle  the  cat,  and  a  tame  gray 
squirrel  who  hunts  our  pockets  for  nuts,  we 
contrive  to  get  through  the  short  dark  days." 

Again :  "I  am  thankful  that  February  has 
come,  and  that  the  sun  is  getting  high  on  his 
northern  journey.  The  past  month  has  been 
trying  to  flesh  and  spirit.  ...  I  am  afraid  my 
letter  has  a  complaining  tone,  and  I  am  rather 


WHITTIER  319 

ashamed  of  it,  and  shall  be  more  so  when  my 
head  is  less  out  of  order.  .  .  .  There  are  two 
gray  squirrels  playing  in  my  room.  Phoebe  calls 
them  Deacon  Josiah  and  his  wife  Philury,  after 
Rose  Terry  Cooke's  story  of  the  minister's 
'  week  of  works  '  in  the  place  of  a  *  week  of 
prayer.' " 

He  showed  more  physical  vitality  after  he 
went  to  Danvers,  and  his  notes  evince  a  wide 
interest  in  matters  private  and  public  outside 
his  own  library  life.  He  still  went  to  Portland 
to  see  his  niece  and  her  husband  whenever 
he  was  able,  and  now  and  then  to  Boston 
also.  But  Philadelphia  at  the  time  of  the  Cen 
tennial  was  not  to  be  thought  of.  "I  sent 
my  hymn,"  he  wrote  from  Amesbury  in  1876, 
"  with  many  misgivings,  and  am  glad  it  was  so 
well  received.  I  think  I  should  like  to  have 
heard  the  music,  but  probably  I  should  not 
have  understood.  The  gods  have  made  me 
most  unmusical. 

"I  have  just  got  J.  T.  F.'s  charming  little 
book  of  '  Barry  Cornwall  and  His  Friends.'  It 
is  a  most  companionable  volume,  and  will  give 
rare  pleasure  to  thousands.  ...  I  write  in  the 
midst  of  our  Quaker  quarterly  meeting,  and  our 
house  has  been  overrun  for  three  days.  We 
had  twelve  to  dine  to-day ;  they  have  now  gone 
to  meeting,  but  I  am  too  tired  for  preaching. 

"I  don't  expect  to  visit  Philadelphia.  The 
very  thought  of  that  Ezekiel's  vision  of  machin- 


320  WHITTIER 

ery  and  the  nightmare  confusion  of  the  world's 
curiosity  shop  appalls  me.  I  shall  not  venture." 

He  was  full  of  excellent  resolutions  about 
going  often  to  Boston,  but  he  never  could  make 
a  home  there.  "  I  see  a  great  many  more 
things  in  the  city  than  thee  does,"  he  would 
say,  "because  I  go  to  town  so  seldom.  The 
shop  windows  are  a  delight  to  me,  and  every 
thing  and  everybody  is  novel  and  interesting. 
I  don't  need  to  go  to  the  theatre.  I  have  more 
theatre  than  I  can  take  in  every  time  I  walk 
out." 

No  sketch  of  Whittier,  however  slight,  should 
omit  to  mention  his  friendship  for  Bayard  Tay 
lor.  Their  Quaker  parentage  helped  to  bring 
the  two  poets  into  communion  ;  and  although 
Taylor  was  so  much  the  younger  and  more 
vigorous  man,  Whittier  was  also  to  see  him 
pass,  and  to  mourn  his  loss.  He  took  a  deep 
interest  in  his  literary  advancement,  and  con 
sidered  "  Lars  "  his  finest  poem.  Certainly  no 
one  knew  Taylor's  work  better,  or  brought  a 
deeper  sympathy  into  his  reading  of  it.  "  I 
love  him  too  well  to  be  a  critic  of  his  verse," 
he  says  in  one  of  his  letters.  "  But  what  a 
brave  worker  he  was  !  " 

The  reading  of  good  books  was,  very  late  in 
life,  as  it  had  been  very  early,  his  chief  pleas 
ure.  His  travels,  his  romance,  his  friendships, 
were  indulged  in  chiefly  by  proxy  of  the  printed 
page.  "  I  felt  very  near  Dr.  Mulf ord  through 


WHITTIER  321 

his  writings,"  he  said.  "He  was  the  strongest 
thinker  of  our  time,  and  he  thought  in  the 
right  direction.  '  The  Republic  of  God '  is  in 
tellectually  greater  than  St.  Augustine's  '  City 
of  God/  and  infinitely  nearer  the  Christian 
ideal."  ' 

"That  must  be  a  shrewd  zephyr,"  Charles 
Lamb  used  to  say,  speaking  of  his  Gentle 
Giantess,  "  that  can  escape  her."  And  so  we 
may  say  of  Whittier  and  a  book.  "  Has  thee 
seen  the  new  book  by  the  author  of  'Mr. 
Isaacs  '  ? "  he  asked  (having  sent  me  "  Mr. 
Isaacs "  as  soon  as  it  appeared,  lest  I  should 
miss  reading  so  novel  and  good  a  story).  In 
the  same  breath  he  adds :  "  I  have  been 
reading  'The  Freedom  of  Faith,'  by  the  au 
thor  of  '  On  the  Threshold,'  just  published  by 
Houghton  &  Co.  It  is  refreshing  and  tonic  as 
the  northwest  wind.  The  writer  is  one  of  the 
leaders  of  the  new  departure  from  the  ultra- 
Calvinism.  Thank  thee  just  here  for  the  pleasure 
of  reading  Annie  Keary's  biography.  What  a 
white,  beautiful  soul !  Her  views  of  the  mis 
sion  of  spiritualism  seem  very  much  like 's. 

I  do  not  know  when  I  have  read  a  more  rest 
ful,  helpful  book. 

"  How  good  Longfellow's  poem  is  !  A  little 
sad,  but  full  of  '  sweetness  and  light.'  Emer 
son,  Longfellow,  Holmes,  and  myself  are  all 
getting  to  be  old  fellows,  and  that  swan-song 
might  serve  for  us  all.  '  We  who  are  about  to 


322  WHITTIER 

die.'  God  help  us  all !  I  don't  care  for  fame, 
and  have  no  solicitude  about  the  verdicts  of 
posterity. 

"  '  When  the  grass  is  green  above  us 

And  they  who  know  us  and  who  love  us 

Are  sleeping  by  our  side, 
Will  it  avail  us  aught  that  men 
Tell  the  world  with  lip  and  pen 

That  we  have  lived  and  died  ?  * 

"What  we  are  will  then  be  more  important 
than  what  we  have  done  or  said  in  prose  or 
rhyme,  or  what  folks  that  we  never '  saw  or 
heard  of  think  of  us." 

The  following  hitherto  unpublished  poem  was 
written  about  this  period  upon  the  marriage  of 
the  daughter  of  his  friend  Mrs.  Leonowens  :  — 

TO   A.   L. 

WITH  THE   CONGRATULATIONS   OF   HER   MOTHER'S  FRIEND 

The  years  are  many,  the  years  are  old, 

My  dreams  are  over,  my  songs  are  sung, 
But,  out  of  a  heart  that  has  not  grown  cold, 

I  bid  God-speed  to  the  fair  and  young. 
Would  that  my  prayer  were  even  such 
As  the  righteous  pray  availing  much. 
But  nothing  save  good  can  Love  befall, 
And  naught  is  lacking  since  Love  is  all, 
Thy  one  great  blessing  of  life  the  best, 
Like  the  rod  of  Moses  swallows  the  rest ! 

(Signed)  Jonft  G.  WHITTIER. 

Oak  Knoll,  6th  mo.  7,  1878. 

Later  he  describes  himself  as  listening  to 
the  "  Life  of  Mrs.  Stowe."  "It  is  a  satisfying 
book,  a  model  biography,  or,  rather,  autobiogra- 


WHITTIER  323 

phy,  for  dear  Mrs.  Stowe  speaks  all  through  it. 
Dr.  Holmes's  letters  reveal  him  as  he  is  — 
wise,  generous,  chivalrous.  Witness  the  kind 
liness  and  delicate  sympathy  of  his  letters  dur 
ing  the  Lord  Byron  trouble.  .  .  .  Miss  W.  has 
read  us  some  of  Howells's  '  Hazard  of  New  For 
tunes.'  It  strikes  me  that  it  is  a  strong  book. 
That  indomitable  old  German,  Linden  —  that 
saint  of  the  rather  godless  sect  of  dynamiters 
and  anarchists  —  is  a  grand  figure ;  one  can't 
help  loving  him." 

The  poet's  notes  and  letters  are  full  of  pas 
sages  showing  how  closely  he  followed  public 
affairs.  "  If  I  were  not  sick,  and  to-morrow 
were  not  election  day,"  he  says,  "  I  should  go 
to  Boston.  I  hope  to  be  there  in  a  few  days, 
at  any  rate.  You  must  '  vote  early  and  often,' 
and  elect  Hooper.  Here  we  are  having  Mar- 
ryat's  triangular  duel  acted  over  by  our  three 
candidates.  I  wish  they  were  all  carpet-bag 
ging  among  the  Kukluxes.  It  wouldn't  hurt 
us  to  go  without  a  representative  until  we  can 
raise  one  of  our  own."  .  .  . 

And  again:  "I  am  somewhat  disappointed 
by  the  vote  on  the  suffrage  question.  It  should 
be  a  lesson  to  us  not  to  trust  to  political  plat 
forms.  A  great  many  Republicans  declined  to 
vote  for  it  or  against  it.  They  thought  the 
leaders  of  the  suffrage  movement  had  thrown 
themselves  into  the  hands  of  Butler  and  the 
Democrats.  However,  it  is  only  one  of  those 


324  WHITTIER 

set-backs  which  all  reforms  must  have  —  tem 
porary,  but  rather  discouraging. 

"  I  worked  hard  in  our  town,  and  we  made 
a  gain  of  nearly  one  hundred  votes  over  last 
year." 

"  I  am  happy,"  he  says  later,  "  in  the  result 
of  the  election  —  thankful  that  the  State  has 

sat  down  heavily  on .  I  never  thought  of 

taking  an  active  interest  in  politics  this  year, 
but  I  could  not  help  it  when  the  fight  be- 
gan." 

And  still  later  in  life  :  "  I  am  glad  of  the 
grand  overturn  in  Boston,  and  the  courage  of 
the  women  voters.  How  did  it  seem  to  elbow 
thy  way  to  the  polls  through  throngs  of  men 
folk  ? " 

Whittier  never  relinquished  his  house  at 
Amesbury,  where  his  kind  friends,  Judge  Gate 
and  his  wife,  always  made  him  feel  at  home. 
As  the  end  of  his  life  drew  near,  it  was  easy  to 
see  that  the  village  home  where  his  mother 
and  his  sister  lived  and  died  was  the  place  he 
chiefly  loved  ;  but  he  was  more  inaccessible  to 
his  friends  in  Amesbury,  and  the  interruptions 
of  a  fast-growing  factory  town  were  sometimes 
less  agreeable  to  him  than  the  country  life  at 
Oak  Knoll.  He  was  a  great  disbeliever  in  too 
much  solitude,  however,  and  used  to  say,  "  The 
necessary  solitude  of  the  human  soul  is  enough ; 
it  is  surprising  how  great  that  is." 

Once  only  he  expresses  this  preference  for 


WHITTIER  325 

the  dear  old  village  home  in  his  letters.  "  I 
have  been  at  Amesbury  for  a  fortnight.  Some 
how  I  seem  nearer  to  my  mother  and  sister; 
the  very  walls  of  the  rooms  seem  to  have  be 
come  sensitive  to  the  photographs  of  unseen 
presences." 

As  the  end  drew  near,  he  passed  more  and 
more  time  with  his  beloved  cousins  Gertrude 
and  Joseph  Cartland  in  Newburyport,  whose 
interests  and  aims  in  life  were  so  close  to  his 
own. 

The  habit  of  going  to  the  White  Mountains 
in  their  company  for  a  few  weeks  during  the 
heat  of  summer  was  a  fixed  one.  He  grew 
to  love  Asquam,  with  its  hills  and  lakes,  almost 
better  than  any  other  place  for  this  sojourn.  It 
was  there  he  loved  to  beckon  his  friends  to 
join  him.  "  Do  come,  if  possible,"  he  would 
write.  "  The  years  speed  on ;  it  will  soon  be 
too  late.  I  long  to  look  on  your  dear  faces 
once  more." 

His  deafness  began  to  preclude  general  con 
versation  ;  but  he  delighted  in  getting  off  under 
the  pine-trees  in  the  warm  afternoons,  or  into 
a  quiet  room  upstairs  at  twilight,  and  talking 
until  bedtime.  He  described  to  us,  during  one 
visit,  his  first  stay  among  the  hills.  His  parents 
took  him  where  he  could  see  the  great  wooded 
slope  of  Agamenticus.  As  he  looked  up  and 
gazed  with  awe  at  the  solemn  sight,  a  cloud 
drooped,  and  hung  suspended  as  it  were  from 


326  WHITTIER 

one  point,  and  filled  his  soul  with  astonishment. 
He  had  never  forgotten  it.  He  said  nothing 
at  the  time,  but  this  cloud  hanging  from  the 
breast  of  the  hill  filled  his  boyish  mind  with  a 
mighty  wonder,  which  had  never  faded  away. 

Notwithstanding  his  strong  feeling  for  Ames- 
bury,  and  his  presence  there  always  at  "  quar 
terly  meeting,"  he  found  himself  increasingly 
comfortable  in  the  companionship  of  his  devoted 
relatives.  Something  nearer  "  picturesqueness  " 
and  "the  beautiful"  came  to  please  the  sense 
and  to  soothe  the  spirit  at  Oak  Knoll.  He  did 
not  often  make  record  in  his  letters  of  these 
things ;  but  once  he  speaks  charmingly  of  the 
young  girl  in  a  red  cloak,  on  horseback,  with 
the  dog  at  her  side,  scampering  over  the  lawn 
and  brushing  under  the  sloping  branches  of  the 
trees.  The  sunset  of  his  life  burned  slowly 
down ;  and  in  spite  of  illness  and  loss  of  power, 
he  possessed  his  soul  in  patience.  After  a 
period  when  he  usually  felt  unable  to  write,  he 
revived  and  wrote  a  letter,  in  which  he  spoke 
as  follows  of  a  poem  which  had  been  sent  for 
his  revision :  "  The  poem  is  solemn  and  ten 
der  ;  it  is  as  if  a  wind  from  the  Unseen  World 
blew  over  it,  in  which  the  voice  of  sorrow  is 
sweeter  than  that  of  gladness  —  a  holy  fear 
mingled  with  holier  hope.  For  myself,  my 
hope  is  always  associated  with  dread,  like  the 
shining  of  a  star  through  mist.  I  feel,  in 
deed,  that  Love  is  victorious,  that  there  is  no 


WHITTIER  327 

dark  it  cannot  light,  no  depth  it  cannot  reach ; 
but  I  imagine  that  between  the  Seen  and  the 
Unseen  there  is  a  sort  of  neutral  ground,  a 
land  of  shadow  and  mystery,  of  strange  voices 
and  undistinguished  forms.  There  are  some, 
as  Charles  Lamb  says,  *  who  stalk  into  futurity 
on  stilts,'  without  awe  or  self -distrust.  But  I 
can  only  repeat  the  words  of  the  poem  before 
me."  ... 

One  of  the  last,  perhaps  the  very  last  visit 
he  made  to  his  friends  in  Boston  was  in  the 
beautiful  autumn  weather.  The  familiar  faces 
he  hoped  to  find  were  absent.  He  arrived  with 
out  warning,  and  the  very  loveliness  of  the 
atmosphere  which  made  it  possible  for  him  to 
travel  had  tempted  younger  people  out  among 
the  falling  leaves.  He  was  disappointed,  and 
soon  after  sent  these  verses  to  rehearse  his 
experience  :  — 

"  I  stood  within  the  vestibule 

Whose  granite  steps  I  knew  so  well, 
While  through  the  empty  rooms  the  bell 
Responded  to  my  eager  pull. 

"  I  listened  while  the  bell  once  more 

Rang  through  the  void,  deserted  hall ; 
I  heard  no  voice,  nor  light  fqot-fall, 
And  turned  me  sadly  from  the  door. 

"  Though  fair  was  Autumn's  dreamy  day, 
And  fair  the  wood-paths  carpeted 
With  fallen  leaves  of  gold  and  red, 
I  missed  a  dearer  sight  than  they. 

"  I  missed  the  love-transfigured  face, 
The  glad,  sweet  smile  so  dear  to  me, 


328  WHITTIER 

The  clasp  of  greeting  warm  and  free : 
What  had  the  round  world  in  their  place  ? 

"  O  friend,  whose  generous  love  has  made 
My  last  days  best,  my  good  intent 
Accept,  and  let  the  call  I  meant 
Be  with  your  coming  doubly  paid." 

But  even  this  journey  was  beyond  his 
strength.  He  wrote :  "  Coming  back  from 
Boston  in  a  crowded  car,  a  window  was  opened 
just  behind  me  and  another  directly  opposite, 
and  in  consequence  I  took  a  bad  cold,  -and  am 
losing  much  of  this  goodly  autumnal  spectacle. 
But  Oak  Knoll  woods  were  never,  I  think,  so 
beautiful  before." 

In  future  his  friends  were  to  seek  him ;  he 
could  go  no  more  to  them  :  the  autumn  had  in 
deed  set  in. 

Now  began  a  series  of  birthday  celebrations, 
which  were  blessings  not  unmixed  in  his  cup  of 
life.  He  was  in  the  habit  of  writing  a  brief 
note  of  remembrance  on  these  anniversaries  ;  in 
one  of  which,  after  confessing  to  "  a  feeling  of 
sadness  and  loneliness,"  he  turns  to  the  Emer 
son  Calendar,  and  says,  "I  found  for  the  day 
some  lines  from  his  '  World  Soul : '  — 

" '  Love  wakes  anew  this  throbbing  heart, 

And  we  are  never  old  ; 
Over  the  winter  glaciers 

I  see  the  summer  glow, 
And  through  the  wild  piled  snow-drift 

The  warm  rose-buds  blow.' 

Reading  them,  I  took  heart." 


WHITTIER  ,  329 

On  another  occasion  he  says  :  "In  the  inter 
vals  of  visitation  on  that  day  my  thoughts  were 
with  dear  friends  who  have  passed  from  us ; 
among  whom,  I  need  not  say,  was  thy  dearest 
friend.  How  vividly  the  beautiful  mornings 
with  you  were  recalled !  Then  I  wondered  at 
my  age,  and  if  it  was  possible  that  I  was  the 
little  boy  on  the  old  Haverhill  farm,  unknown, 
and  knowing  nobody  beyond  my  home  horizon. 
I  could  not  quite  make  the  connection  of  the 
white-haired  man  with  the  black-locked  boy.  I 
could  not  help  a  feeling  of  loneliness,  thinking  of 
having  outlived  many  of  my  life-companions  ;  but 
I  was  still  grateful  to  God  that  I  had  not  out 
lived  my  love  for  them  and  for  those  still  living. 
Among  the  many  tokens  of  good  will  from  all 
parts  of  the  country  and  beyond  the  sea,  there 
were  some  curious  and  amazing  missives.  One 
Southern  woman  took  the  occasion  to  include 
me  in  her  curse  of  the  l  mean,  hateful  Yankees.' 
To  offset  this,  I  had  a  telegram  from  the  South 
ern  Forestry  Congress  assembled  in  Florida, 
signed  by  president  and  secretary,  informing  me 
that  '  In  remembrance  of  your  birthday,  we 
have  planted  a  live-oak  tree  to  your  memory, 
which,  like  the  leaves  of  the  tree,  will  be  for 
ever  green.' '! 

Birthdays,  on  the  whole,  in  the  face  of 
much  sadness,  brought  him  also  much  that 
was  agreeable  and  delightful  in  remembrance. 
One  old  friend  always  gave  him  great  pleas- 


330  WHITTIER 

lire  by  sending  a  huge  basket  of  gilded  wicker, 
in  which  were  placed  fruits  of  every  variety 
from  all  quarters  of  the  globe,  and  covered 
with  rare  flowers  and  ferns.  In  this  way  he 
visited  the  gardens  of  the  Orient,  and  could 
see  in  his  imagination  the  valleys  of  Napa  and 
of  Shiraz.  On  the  occasion  of  a  dinner  given 
him  at  the  Brunswick  Hotel,  on  his  seventieth 
birthday,  he  wrote  :  "  I  missed  my  friend.  In 
the  midst  of  so  much  congratulation,  I  do  not 
forget  his  earlier  appreciation  and  encourage 
ment,  and  every  kind  word  which  assured  and 
cheered  me  when  the  great  public  failed  to 
recognize  me.  I  dare  not  tell  thee,  for  fear  of 
seeming  to  exaggerate,  how  much  his  words  have 
been  to  me." 

Thus  the  long  years  and  the  long  days  passed 
on  with  scarcely  perceptible  diminution  of  in 
terest  in  the  affairs  of  this  world.  "  I  am  sorry 
to  find  that  the  hard  winter  has  destroyed  some 
handsome  spruces  I  planted  eight  years  ago," 
he  wrote  one  May  day  ;  "  they  had  grown  to  be 
fine  trees.  Though  rather  late  for  me,  I  shall 
plant  others  in  their  places  ;  for  I  remember  the 
advice  of  the  old  Laird  of  Dumbiedikes  to  his 
son  Jock  :  '  When  ye  hae  naething  better  to  do, 
ye  can  be  aye  sticking  in  a  tree ;  it  '11  aye  be 
growin'  when  ye  are  sleeping.'  There  is  an 
ash-tree  growing  here  that  my  mother  planted 
with  her  own  hands  at  threescore  and  ten. 
What  agnostic  folly  to  think  that  tree  has  out 
lived  her  who  planted  it !  " 


WHITTIER  331 

The  lines  of  Whittier's  life  stretched  "be 
tween  heaven  and  home  "  during  the  long  period 
of  eighty-four  years.  A  host  of  friends,  friends 
of  the  spirit,  were,  as  we  have  seen,  forever 
clustering  around  him  ;  and  what  a  glorious  com 
pany  it  was  !  Follen,  Shipley,  Chalkley,  Lucy 
Hooper,  Joseph  Sturge,  Channing,  Lydia  Maria 
Child,  his  sister  Elizabeth  —  a  shining  cloud  too 
numerous  to  mention  ;  the  inciters  of  his  poems 
and  the  companions  of  his  fireside.  In  the  si 
lence  of  his  country  home  their  memories  clus 
tered  about  him  and  filled  his  heart  with  joy. 

"  He  loved  the  good  and  wise,  but  found 

His  human  heart  to  all  akin 
Who  met  him  on  the  common  ground 
Of  suffering  and  of  sin." 

His  "  Home  Ballads  "  grew  out  of  this  very 
power  of  clinging  to  the  same  places  and  the 
old  loves,  and  what  an  incomparable  group  they 
make  !  "  Telling  the  Bees,"  "  Skipper  Ireson's 
Ride,"  "My  Playmate,"  "In  School  Days,"  are 
sufficient  in  themselves  to  set  the  seal  to  his 
great  fame. 

As  a  traveler,  too,  he  is  unrivaled,  giving  us, 
without  leaving  his  own  garden,  the  fine  fruit 
of  foreign  lands.  In  reading  his  poems  of  the 
East,  it  is  difficult  to  believe  that  he  never  saw 
Palestine,  nor  Ceylon,  nor  India ;  and  the  wonder 
is  no  less  when  he  writes  of  our  own  wide  coun 
try.  Indeed,  the  vividness  of  his  poems  about 
the  slaves  at  St.  Helena's  Island  and  elsewhere 


332  WHITTIER 

make  them  among  the  finest  of  all  his  local 
poems.  One  called  "  The  Pass  of  the  Sierra  " 
may  easily  bear  the  palm  among  much  descrip 
tive  writing. 

He  watched  over  his  last  remaining  brother 
during  a  long  illness  and  death,  during  the 
autumn  and  winter  of  1882  and  1883  in  Boston. 
The  family  all  left  Oak  Knoll  and  came  to  be 
with  him  at  a  hotel,  whence  he  could  make  fre 
quent  visits  to  his  brother's  bedside  ;  but  the 
unwonted  experience  of  passing  several  months 
in  town,  and  the  wearing  mission  which  brought 
him  there,  told  seriously  upon  his  health,  and 
caused  well-grounded  anxiety  as  to  the  result. 
The  day  after  the  last  services  had  been  per 
formed  he  wrote  to  a  friend  :  "  Indeed,  it  was 
a  great  comfort  to  sit  beside  you  and  to  feel 
that  if  another  beloved  one  had  passed  into  the 
new  life  beyond  sight  and  hearing,  the  warm 
hearts  of  loved  friends  were  beating  close  to 
my  own.  You  do  not  know  how  grateful  it  was 
to  me.  Dr.  Clarke's  presence  and  words  were 
full  of  comfort.  My  brother  did  not  approve 
of  a  display  of  flowers,  but  he  loved  violets, 
and  your  simple  flowers  were  laid  in  his  hand. 
.  .  .  Give  my  love  to  S.,  and  kiss  the  dear  child 
for  me." 

It  was  not,  however,  until  1890  that  we  could 
really  feel  he  had  left  the  years  of  active  ser 
vice  and  of  intellectual  achievement  as  things 
of  the  past.  He  was  shut  out  from  much  that 


WHITTIER  333 

gave  him  pleasure,  but  the  spirit  which  ani 
mated  the  still  breathing  frame,  though  waiting 
and  at  times  longing  for  larger  opportunity, 
seemed  to  us  like  a  loving  sentinel,  covering 
his  dear  ones  as  with  a  shield,  and  watching 
over  the  needs  of  humanity.  The  advance  of 
the  colored  people,  the  claims  of  the  Indians 
and  their  wrongs,  opportunities  for  women, 
statesmen,  and  politicians,  the  private  joys  and 
sorrows  of  those  dear  to  him,  were  all  present 
and  kept  alive,  though  in  the  silence  of  his 
breast. 

The  end  came,  the  door  opened,  while  he 
was  staying  with  the  daughter  of  an  old  friend 
at  Hampton  Falls,  in  New  Hampshire — that 
saintly  woman  whom  we  associate  with  one  of 
the  most  spiritual  and  beautiful  of  his  poems, 
"A  Friend's  Burial."  After  a  serious  illness 
in  the  winter  of  1892  he  was  almost  too  frail 
for  any  summer  journeying ;  but  with  his  usual 
wisdom  and  instinctive  turning  of  the  heart 
towards  old  familiar  places,  he  thought  of  this 
hospitable  house  where  he  seemed  to  gain 
strength,  and  where  he  found  much  happiness 
and  the  quietness  that  he  loved.  His  last  ill 
ness  was  brief ;  he  was  ministered  to  by  those 
who  stood  nearest  him.  And  thus  the  waves 
of  time  passed  over  him  and  swept  him  from 
our  sight. 

It  is  a  pleasure  now  to  recall  many  a  beau 
tiful  scene  in  summer  afternoons,  under  the 


334  WHITTIER 

trees  at  Danvers,  when  his  spirit  animated  the 
air  and  made  the  landscape  shine  with  a  radi 
ance  not  its  own.  Such  memories  serve  to 
keep  the  whole  world  beautiful  wherein  he 
moved,  and  add  to  his  poetry  a  sense  of  pres 
ence  and  a  living  light. 

Old  age  appears  in  comparison  to  every  other 
stage  of  human  existence  as  a  most  undesir 
able  state.  We  look  upon  its  approaches  and 
its  ravages  with  alarm.  Death  itself  is  far  less 
dreadful,  and  "the  low  door,"  if  it  will  only 
open  quickly,  brings  little  fear  to  the  thoughtful 
mind.  But  the  mystery  of  decadence,  the  long 
sunsetting,  the  loss  of  power — what  do  they 
mean  ?  The  Latin  word  saga,  from  which  the 
French  get  la  sagesse,  and  we  "  the  sage,"  gives 
us  a  hint  of  what  we  do  not  always  under 
stand  —  the  spiritual  beauty  and  the  significance 
even  of  loss  in  age. 

Whittier,  wearing  his  silver  crown,  brought 
the  antique  word  into  use  again,  and  filled  it 
with  fresh  meaning  for  modern  men. 


TENNYSON 


TENNYSON 

IT  is  difficult  at  the  present  time,  when  Tenny 
son's  poetry  has  become  a  part  of  the  air  we 
breathe,  to  look  back  into  the  world  of  litera 
ture  as  it  existed  before  he  came. 

There  is  a  keen  remembrance,  lingering  in- 
eradicably  with  the  writer,  of  a  little  girl  coming 
to  school  once  upon  recitation  day,  with  a 
"piece  "  of  her  own  selection  safely  stored  away 
in  her  childish  memory.  It  was  a  new  poem  to 
the  school,  and  when  her  turn  came  to  recite 
her  soul  was  full  of  the  gleam  and  glory  of 
Camelot.  She  felt  as  if  she  were  unlocking 
a  treasure-house,  and  it  was  with  unspeakable 
pleasure  to  herself  that  she  gave,  verse  after 
verse,  the  entire  poem  of  "The  Lady  of 
Shalott."  Doubtless  the  child's  voice  drifted 
away  into  sing-song,  as  her  whole  little  self 
seemed  to  drift  away  into  the  land  of  faery, 
and  doubtless  also  the  busy  teacher,  who  was 
more  familiar  with  Jane  Taylor  and  Cowper, 
was  sadly  puzzled.  When  the  child  at  length 
sat  down,  scarcely  knowing  where  she  was  in 
her  sudden  descent  from  the  land  of  marvel, 
she  heard  the  teacher  say,  to  her  amazement 


338  TENNYSON 

and  discouragement,  after  an  ominous  pause, 
"  I  wonder  if  any  young  lady  can  tell  me.  what 
this  poem  means  ? "  There  was  no  reply. 

"  Can  you  tell  us  ? "  was  the  next  question, 
pointed  at  the  poor  little  girl  who  had  just 
dropped  out  of  cloudland.  "  I  thought  it  ex 
plained  itself,"  was  the  plaintive  reply.  With 
a  slight  air  of  depreciation,  in  another  moment 
the  next  recitation  was  called  for,  and  the  dull 
clouds  of  routine  shut  down  over  the  sudden 
glory.  "  Shades  of  the  prison-house  "  then  and 
there  began  to  close  over  the  growing  child. 
One  joy  had  for  the  present  faded  from  her  life, 
that  of  a  sure  sympathy  and  understanding. 
Not  even  her  teacher  could  see  what  she  saw, 
nor  could  feel  what  lay  deep  down  in  her  own 
glowing  heart.  Nevertheless  Tennyson  was 
henceforth  a  seer  and  a  prophet  to  this  child 
and  to  the  growing  world ;  but  for  some,  who 
could  never  learn  his  language,  he  was  born  too 
late. 

The  picturesqueness  of  Scott  and  Byron,  the 
simple  piety  of  Cowper,  had  satisfied  the  poetic 
and  religious  nature  of  the  world  up  to  that  time. 
Shelley  and  Keats  had  indeed  lived,  but  men 
had  scarcely  then  learned  generally  to  read 
them.  Tennyson  may  be  looked  upon  as  their 
interpreter,  in  a  measure,  to  the  common  world. 
Even  Wordsworth,  the  mountain-top  of  poetry, 
the  leader,  whom  Tennyson  called  his  master  — 
even  he  failed  to  give  the  common  mind,  which 


TENNYSON  339 

looks  for  drama,  any  long  poem  which  he  who 
runs  may  read.  This  humanity  in  poetry  is 
distinctly,  first  of  all,  Shakespearian  ;  but  if  this 
quality  should  seem  to  any  reader  not  also 
Tennysonian,  let  him  re-read  "Guinevere,"  in 
the  "Idylls  of  the  King,"  and  reverse  his  de 
cision. 

The  hearts  of  men  were  largely  attuned  by 
Tennyson,  and  taught  to  understand  the  affini 
ties  and  symbolisms  of  nature.  This  new  era 
in  literature  opened  about  the  year  1830,  when 
Tennyson  gave  a  few  poems  to  the  world,  which 
were  chiefly  canceled  by  his  later  judgment. 
A  small  book  in  green  paper  covers  lies  before 
me  as  I  write,  "privately  printed  "  in  1862,  con 
taining  his  poems  printed  between  1830  and 
1833,  and  giving  the  first  readings  of  some 
which  have  been  sanctioned  in  his  later  editions. 
The  volume  "  privately  printed  "  has  been  most 
privately  treasured  lest  anything  should  appear 
from  it  to  "vex  the  poet's  mind."  For  thirty 
years  it  has  lain  in  a  secret  drawer,  with  these 
words  inscribed  upon  the  cover  :  "  Not  to  be 
lent ;  not  to  be  stolen ;  not  to  be  given  away." 

Some  of  these  poems  have  been  wrought 
over  until  we  are  reminded  of  his  own  line, 

"  Laborious  orient  ivory  sphere  in  sphere ;  " 

others  seem  to  have  been  gathered  up  and  pub 
lished  without  permission  by  an  American  pub 
lisher,  who  in  some  way  gained  possession  of 


340  TENNYSON 

the  book.  The  present  perfected  edition,  how 
ever,  published  by  Macmillan,  evidently  con 
tains  all  the  poems  Tennyson  wished  to  have 
remembered.  The  chief  interest  in  the  small 
green  book  is  in  the  early  readings,  which  are  a 
good  study  for  those  who  pursue  the  art  of 
poetry.  We  see  in  them  the  sure  integrity  of 
the  master-hand. 

"  Isabel  "  was  not,  perhaps,  one  of  the  very 
earliest  poems,  although  it  stands  among  the 
early  poems  of  character  in  the  perfected  edi 
tion.  It  does  not  appear  in  the  green  book, 
yet  the  title  already  stands  in  the  table  of  con 
tents.  In  his  own  revised  editions  it  has  always 
appeared  unchanged  from  the  first.  There  is  a 
flawless  loveliness  in  this  poem  which  makes  it 
especially  worthy  of  admiration.  "  Isabel  "  pos 
sesses  a  peculiar  interest,  because  it  is  under 
stood  to  be  the  poet's  tribute  to  his  wife,  and 
indeed  even  his  imaginative  eye  could  hardly 
elsewhere  have  found  another  to  whom  this  de 
scription  would  so  properly  fit  :  — 

"  The  intuitive  decision  of  a  bright 

And  thorough-edged  intellect  to  part 

Error  from  crime ;  a  prudence  to  withhold 
The  laws  of  marriage  character'd  in  gold 
Upon  the  blanched  tablets  of  her  heart ; 
A  love  still  burning  upward,  giving  light 
To  read  those  laws ;  an  accent  very  low 
In  blandishment,  but  a  most  silver  flow 
Of  subtle-paced  counsel  in  distress, 
Right  to  the  heart  and  brain,  tho'  undescried, 
Winning  its  way  with  extreme  gentleness 


TENNYSON  341 

Thro'  all  the  outworks  of  suspicious  pride 
A  courage  to  endure  and  to  obey ; 
A  hate  of  gossip  parlance  and  of  sway, — 
Crown'd  Isabel,  thro'  all  her  placid  life, 
The  queen  of  marriage,  a  most  perfect  wife." 

The  relation  of  Tennyson's  life  to  that  of 
other  men  has  been  but  imperfectly  understood. 
There  was  indeed  a  natural  sublimity  in  his 
character  which  gave  him,  as  he  has  himself  said 
of  the  poet's  mind,  a  power  for  scorn  of  things 
fit  to  be  scorned  ;  but  his  capacity  for  friendship 
has  been  proved  again  and  again.  The  tree,  as 
of  old,  is  known  by  its  fruits,  and  we  need  only 
recall  the  poems  to  James  Spedding,  to  F.  D. 
Maurice,  to  Mary  Boyle,  to  Lord  Dufferin,  his 
correspondence  with  Edward  Fitzgerald,  and 
the  great  note  of  grief  and  consolation  in  "  In 
Memoriam,"  to  know  a  man  capable  of  friend 
ship,  and  one  who  has  drawn  to  himself  the 
noble  lovers  of  his  time. 

There  was  an  unconsciousness  of  outward 
things,  of  the  furniture  of  life,  which  left  him 
freer  than  most  men  to  face  the  individual  soul 
that  approached  him.  There  was  also  a  fine 
consistency  in  his  personality,  —  no  tampering 
with  the  world  ;  no  trying  to  serve  two  masters. 
The  greatness  of  his  presence  was  felt,  we  be 
lieve,  by  all  who  approached  him  ;  he  seemed  to 
be  invested  by  a  strange  remoteness  from  the 
affairs  of  the  world.  Yet  it  was  easy  for  the 
spirits  to  draw  near  to  him  who  really  wanted 
what  he  could  give.  His  hospitality  was  large 


342  TENNYSON 

and  sincere.     In  his  own  words  of  the  "  Great 
Duke  "  we  read  his  perfect  likeness  :  — 

"  As  the  greatest  only  are, 
In  his  simplicity  sublime." 

A  friend  who  knew  him  wrote  once :  "  Ten 
nyson  found  out  in  the  golden  season  of  his 
life,  his  youth,  just  what  kind  of  work  he  was 
fitted  to  do,  and  he  never  squandered  an  hour 
in  search  of  his  primary  bearings.  .  .  .  There  is 
always  a  gravity  about  him,  a  becoming  noble 
ness,  which  reminds  one  of  what  $t.  Simon 
said  of  Fe"nelon,  '  When  he  is  present  it  requires 
an  effort  to  cease  looking  at  him.' ' 

When  this  friend  returned  after  his  first  in 
terview  with  Tennyson,  many  years  ago,  we 
can  well  recall  the  eagerness  with  which  we 
listened.  His  excitement  as  he  described  the 
hours  they  had  passed  together  was  hardly  less 
than  that  of  his  hearer.  Every  minute  detail  of 
the  interview  was  impatiently  demanded.  "  How 
did  he  look  ? "  was  asked  immediately  in  the 
first  pause,  and  "What  did  he  say?"  followed 
before  there  was  quite  time  to  speak.  In  reply 
came  a  full  description  of  the  tall  figure,  clad 
in  a  long  gray  dressing-gown,  presenting  itself 
in  the  half -opened  doorway  of  his  chambers  in 
the  Temple,  and  looking  cautiously  out  at  the 
new  comer. 

"  '  Oh  !  it  is  you/  he  said,  drawing  his  visitor 
in  through  the  narrow  space  with  a  most  cor 
dial  welcome.  He  was  sitting  before  the  fire, 


TENNYSON  343 

with  his  books  about  him,  which  he  put  aside, 
and  while  he  talked  he  began  to  toast  sundry 
slices  of  bread  for  our  repast.  As  for  his  looks, 
his  head  is  a  very  grand  one,  and  his  voice  has 
a  deep  swelling  richness  in  it.  He  had  just  re 
ceived  from  the  printers  some  proof  sheets  of 
the  '  Idylls  of  the  King/  and  then  and  there  he 
chanted  the  story  of  Enid  and  Elaine  :  chanted 
is  the  true  word  to  apply  to  his  recitations. 
He  had  a  theory  that  poetry  should  always  be 
given  out  with  the  rhythm  accentuated,  and  the 
music  of  the  verse  strongly  emphasized,  and  he 
did  it  with  a  power  that  was  marvelous." 

The  next  recollection,  and  one  that  sweeps 
vividly  across  my  memory,  is  that  of  going  to 
Farringford  for  the  first  time,  and  seeing  Ten 
nyson  among  the  surroundings  so  admirably 
suited  to  his  tastes  and  necessities.  The  place 
was  much  more  retired  than  at  present ;  indeed, 
there  was  neither  sight  nor  sound  of  any  intru 
sion  during  those  summer  days.  The  island 
might  have  been  Prospero's  own,  it  seemed  so 
still  and  far  away. 

Beyond  the  gardens  and  the  lawn  the  great 
downs  sloped  to  the  sea,  and  in  the  distance  on 
either  hand  could  be  seen  the  cliffs  and  shores 
as  they  wound  away  and  were  lost  in  the  dim 
haze  that  lay  between  us  and  the  horizon.  We 
found  ourselves  suddenly  walking  as  in  a  dream, 
surrounded  with  the  scenery  of  his  poems. 

It  is  still   easy  to  distinguish  with  perfect 


344  TENNYSON 

clearness  to  the  "  inward  eye "  two  figures 
rambling  along  the  downs  that  lovely  day,  and 
pausing  at  a  rude  summer-house,  a  kind  of  for 
gotten  shelter,  a  relic  of  some  other  life.  The 
great  world  was  still  as  only  the  noon  of  sum 
mer  knows  how  to  be  ;  the  air  blew  freshly  up 
from  the  sea,  and  the  figures  stopped  a  moment 
to  look  and  rest.  The  door  of  the  shelter  hung 
idly  on  rusted  hinges,  and  the  two  entered  to 
enjoy  the  shade.  Turning,  they  saw  the  whole 
delicious  scene  framed  in  the  rude  doorway. 
"Ah,"  the  lady -said,  "I  have  found  one  of 
your  haunts.  I  think  you  must  sometimes 
write  here."  Tennyson  looked  at  her  with  a 
smile  which  said,  "  I  can  trust  my  friends ; " 
and  putting  his  hand  up  high  over  the  door,  he 
took  from  the  tiny  ledge  a  bit  of  pencil  and 
paper  secreted  there,  held  them  out  to  her  for 
one  moment,  and  then  carefully  put  them  back 
again.  There  was  not  much  said,  but  it  was 
an  immediate  revelation,  and  a  cherished  bit  of 
confidence.  Perhaps  on  that  sheet  was  already 
inscribed, 

"  Ask  me  no  more ;  the  moon  may  draw  the  sea, 
The  cloud  may  stoop  from  heaven  and  take  the  shape, 
With  fold  on  fold,  of  mountain  or  of  cape  ; " 

or  perhaps  the  page  was  waiting  for  "The 
Sailor-Boy,"  or  glimpses  of  the  great  "Tyn- 
tagel,"  or  "  Lyonesse." 

I  could  not  know,  nor  did  he,  what  he  was 
yet  to  do.     I  only  felt  —  all  who  knew  him  felt 


TENNYSON  345 

—  that  he  knew  his  work  demanded  from  him 
the  sacrifice  of  what  the  world  calls  pleasure. 
He  endeavored  to  hold  his  spirit  ready,  and  his 
mind  trained  and  responsive. 

His  constant  preoccupation  with  the  business 
of  his  life  rendered  him  often  impatient  of  wast 
ing  hours  in  mere  "  personal  talk.'*  He  was 
always  eager  and  ready  to  hear  of  large  matters 
of  church  or  state  from  those  who  were  com 
petent  to  inform  him ;  but  it  was  his  chief  joy, 
when  his  friends  were  gathered  about  him,  to 
read  from  other  poets  or  from -his  own  books. 

In  this  same  visit  there  was  much  talk  of 
Milton,  of  whom  he  spoke  as  "  the  great  organ 
ist  of  verse,  who  always  married  sound  to  sense 
when  he  wrote."  Surely  no  one  ever  gave  the 
lines  of  that  great  poet  as  he  did.  It  was  won 
derful  to  hear.  It  would  be  impossible  to  for 
get  that  grand  voice  as  he  repeated  :  — 

"  The  imperial  ensign  which  full  high  advanced 
Shone  like  a  meteor  streaming  to  the  wind, 
With  gems  and  golden  lustre  rich  emblazed, 
Seraphic  arms  and  trophies  ;  all  the  while 
Sonorous  metal  blowing  martial  sounds." 

Tennyson's  chanting  of  his  own  "  Boadicea  " 
was  very  remarkable. 

"Thine  the  liberty,  thine  the  glory,  thine  the  deeds  to  be 

celebrated, 

Thine  the  myriad-rolling  ocean,  light  and  shadow  illimita 
ble." 

But  nothing  could  excel  the  effect  of  his  ren 
dering  of  "  Guinevere,"  his  voice  at  times  trem- 


346  TENNYSON 

ulous  with  emotion,  and  his  face  turned  from 
the  light  as  he  read, 

"  Let  no  man  dream  but  that  I  love  thee  still," 

and  all  the  noble  context  glowing  with  a  white 
heat.  It  was  easy  then  to  find  that  his  own 
ideal, 

"  Flos  regum  Arthurus," 

was  not  a  legend  to  him  alone,  but  a  vision  of 
the  Holy  Grail  toward  which  he  aspired. 

It  were  easy,  indeed  it  is  a  temptation,  to 
record  every  detail,  stamped  as  they  all  are 
on  the  memory  after  several  visits  at  Farring- 
ford  and  at  Aldworth ;  but  the  beautiful  paper 
printed  only  a  few  years  ago  by  Mrs.  Anne 
Thackeray  Ritchie,  now  given  to  the  world  in 
a  volume,  where  Tennyson  stands  as  one  of 
"The  Light-Bearers,"  would  make  any  repeti 
tion  of  the  history  of  his  family  life  worse  than 
unnecessary.  Mrs.  Ritchie's  friendship  with 
the  members  of  that  household,  and  her  famil 
iarity  with  the  houses  and  scenery  which  sur 
rounded  them,  have  given  her  the  opportunity 
to  do  what  her  genius  has  executed. 

Summer  was  again  here,  with  a  touch  of 
autumn  in  the  air  —  this  autumn  in  which  we 
write  —  when  we  last  saw  Lord  Tennyson  at 
Aldworth.  He  was  already  unwell  and  suffer 
ing  from  a  cold.  He  sat,  however,  on  his  couch, 
which  was  drawn  across  the  great  window, 
where  he  could  look  off,  when  he  turned  his 


TENNYSON  347 

head,  and  see  the  broad  green  valley  and  the 
hills  beyond,  or,  near  at  hand,  could  watch  the 
terrace  and  his  own  trees,  and  catch  a  glimpse 
of  the  garden. 

The  great  frame  had  lost  its  look  of  giant 
strength;  the  hands  were  thinner;  but  the 
habit  of  his  mind  and  spirit  was  the  same. 
Again  we  heard  the  voice ;  again  we  felt  the 
uplift  of  his  presence.  He  was  aware  that  he 
was  not  to  stay  here  much  longer,  and  when 
we  bent  over  him  to  say  good-by,  we  knew 
and  he  knew  it  was  indeed  "farewell."  He 
was  surrounded  with  deep  love  and  tenderness 
and  the  delightful  presence  of  his  little  grand 
children,  and  when,  shortly  after,  his  weakness 
increased,  he  doubtless  heard  the  words  sound 
ing  in  his  mind  :  — 

"  Fear  no  more  the  heat  o'  the  sun, 

Nor  the  furious  winter's  rages, 

Thou  thy  worldly  task  hast  done, 

Home  art  gone,  and  ta'en  thy  wages." 

He  asked  for  "  Cymbeline  "  that  he  might  carry 
the  noble  lines  clearly  in  remembrance.  Later 
the  moon  shone  full  into  the  room,  and  in  that 
dim  splendor,  and  to  the  music  of  the  autumn 
wind,  his  spirit  passed. 


EMILY 
LADY  TENNYSON 


EMILY,    LADY   TENNYSON 

WHEN  I  first  saw  Lady  Tennyson  she  was  in 
the  prime  of  life.  Her  two  sons,  boys  of  eight 
and  ten  years  of  age  perhaps,  were  by  her  side. 
Farringford  was  at  that  time  almost  the  same 
beautiful  solitude  the  lovers  had  found  it  years 
before,  when  it  was  first  their  home.  Occasion 
ally  a  curious  sight-seer,  or  a  poet-worshiper, 
had  been  known  to  stray  across  the  grounds  or 
to  climb  a  tree  in  order  to  view  the  green  retired 
spot  ;  but  as  a  rule  Tennyson  could  still  wan 
der  unwatched  and  unseen  through  the  garden, 
over  the  downs,  and  stand  alone  on  the  shore 
of  the  great  sea. 

It  was  already  afternoon  when  we  arrived 
dusty  and  travel-stained  at  the  hospitable  door, 
which  was  wide  open,  shaded  by  vines,  showing 
the  interior  dark  and  cool.  Mrs.  Tennyson,  in 
her  habitual  and  simple  costume  of  a  long  gray 
dress  and  lace  kerchief  over  her  head,  met  us 
with  her  true  and  customary  cordiality,  leading 
us  to  the  low  drawing-room,  where  a  large  oriel 
window  opening  on  the  lawn  and  the  half-life- 
size  statue  of  Wordsworth  were  the  two  points 
which  caught  my  attention  as  we  entered.  Her 


352  EMILY,   LADY  TENNYSON 

step  as  she  preceded  us  was  long  and  free. 
Something  in  her  bearing  and  trailing  dress, 
perhaps,  gave  her  a  mediaeval  aspect  which 
suited  with  the  house.  The  latter,  I  have  been 
told,  was  formerly  a  baronial  holding,  and  the 
fair  Enid  and  the  young  Elaine  appeared  to  be 
at  one  with  her  own  childhood.  They  were 
no  longer  centuries  apart  from  the  slender  fair- 
haired  lady  who  now  lay  on  a  couch  by  our  side, 
—  they  were  a  portion  of  her  own  existence,  of 
a  nature  obedient  to  tradition,  obedient  to  home, 
obedient  to  love.  The  world  has  made  large 
advance,  and  the  sound  of  the  wheels  of  pro 
gress  were  not  unheard  in  the  lady's  room  at 
Farringford.  She  was  ready  to  sympathize 
with  every  form  of  emancipation ;  but  for  her 
self,  her  poet's  life  was  her  life,  and  his  neces 
sity  was  her  great  opportunity. 

I  recall  Mrs.  Browning  once  saying  to  me, 
"Ah,  Tennyson  is  too  much  indulged.  His 
wife  is  too  much  his  second  self  ;  she  does  not 
criticise  enough."  But  Tennyson  was  not  a 
second  Browning.  The  delicate  framework  of 
his  imagination,  filled  in  by  elemental  harmo 
nies,  was  not  to  be  carelessly  touched.  She 
understood  his  work  and  his  nature,  and  he 
stood  firm  where  he  had  early  planted  himself 
by  her  side  in  worshiping  affection  and  devo 
tion.  "Alfred  carried  the  sheets  of  his  new 
poem  up  to  London,"  she  said  one  day,  "  and 
showed  them  to  Mr.  Monckton  Milnes,  who 


EMILY,   LADY   TENNYSON  353 

persuaded  him  to  leave  out  one  of  the  best 
lines ;  but  I  persuaded  him  to  replace  it  when 
he  came  home.  It  is  a  mistake  in  general  for 
him  to  listen  to  the  suggestions  of  others  about 
his  poems." 

All  this  was  long  ago,  and  the  finger  of  mem 
ory  has  left  faint  tracings  for  me  to  follow ;  but 
I  recall  her  figure  at  dinner  as  she  sat  in  her 
soft  white  muslin  dress,  tied  with  blue,  at  that 
time  hardly  whiter  than  her  face  or  bluer  than 
her  eyes,  and  how  the  boys  stood  sometimes 
one  on  either  side  of  her  in  their  black  velvet 
dresses,  like  Millais'  picture  of  the  princes  in 
the  tower,  and  sometimes  helped  to  serve  the 
guests.  By  and  by  we  adjourned  to  another 
room,  where  there  was  a  fire  and  a  shining  dark 
table  with  fruit  and  wine  after  her  own  pictur 
esque  fashion,  and  where  later  the  poet  read 
to  us,  while  she,  being  always  delicate  in  health, 
took  her  accustomed  couch.  I  remember  the 
quaint  apartment  for  the  night,  on  different 
levels,  and  the  faded  tapestry,  recalling  "the 
faded  mantle  and  the  faded  veil,"  her  tender 
personal  care,  and  her  friendly  good-night,  the 
silence,  the  sweetness,  and  the  calm. 

She  sometimes  joined  our  out-door  expedi 
tions,  but  could  not  walk  with  us.  For  years  she 
used  a  wheeled  chair,  as  Mrs.  Ritchie  has  charm 
ingly  described  in  her  truthful  and  sympathetic 
sketch  of  the  life  at  Aldworth.  I  only  asso 
ciated  her  with  the  interior,  where  her  influence 
was  perfect. 


354  EMILY,   LADY   TENNYSON 

The  social  atmosphere  of  Farringford,  which 
depended  upon  its  mistress,  was  warm  and  sim 
ple.  A  pleasant  company  of  neighbors  and 
friends  was  gathered  when  "  Maud  "  was  read 
aloud  to  us,  a  wide  group,  grateful  and  appre 
ciative,  and  one  to  which  he  liked  to  read. 

After  this  the  mists  of  time  close  over !  I 
can  recall  her  again  in  the  gray  dress  and  ker 
chief  following  our  footsteps  to  the  door.  I  can 
see  her  graceful  movement  of  the  hand  as  she 
waved  her  adieux  ;  I  can  see  the  poet's  dusky 
figure  standing  by  her  side,  and  that  is  all. 

Sometimes  she  lives  dreamily  to  the  world 
of  imagination  as  the  Abbess  at  Almesbury ; 
and  sometimes,  as  one  who  knew  her  has  said, 
she  was  like  the  first  of  the  three  queens,  "  the 
tallest  of  them  all,  and  fairest,"  who  bore  away 
the  body  of  Arthur.  She  was  no  less  than 
these,  being  a  living  inspiration  at  the  heart  of 
the  poet's  every-day  life. 

It  would  seem  to  be  upon  another  visit  that 
we  were  talking  in  the  drawing-room  about 
Browning.  "  We  should  like  to  see  him  of- 
tener,"  she  said,  "  he  is  delightful  company,  but 
we  cannot  get  him  to  come  here ;  we  are  too 
quiet  for  him  !  " 

I  found  food  for  thought  in  this  little  speech 
when  I  remembered  the  fatuous  talk  at  dinner- 
tables  where  I  had  sometimes  met  Browning, 
and  thought  of  Tennyson's  great  talk  and  the 
lofty  serenity  of  his  lady's  presence. 


EMILY,   LADY   TENNYSON  355 

My  last  interview  with  Lady  Tennyson  was 
scarcely  two  months  before  Tennyson's  death. 
The  great  grief  of  their  life  in  the  loss  of  their 
son  Lionel  had  fallen  upon  them  meanwhile. 
They  were  then  at  Aldworth,  which,  although 
a  house  of  their  own  building,  was  far  more 
mediaeval  in  appearance  than  Farringford.  She 
was  alone,  and  still  on  the  couch  in  the  large 
drawing-room,  and  there  she  spoke  with  the 
same  youth  of  heart,  the  same  deep  tender 
ness,  the  same  simple  affection  which  had  never 
failed  through  years  of  intercourse.  When  she 
rose  to  say  farewell  and  to  follow  me  as  far  as 
possible,  she  stepped  with  the  same  spirited 
sweep  I.  had  first  seen. 

The  happiness  of  welcoming  her  lovely  face, 
which  wore  to  those  who  knew  her  an  inde 
scribable  heavenliness,  is  mine  no  more ;  but 
the  memory  cannot  be  effaced  of  one  lady  who 
held  the  traditions  of  high  womanhood  safe 
above  the  possible  deteriorations  of  human  ex 
istence. 


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